Doors Through Walls
by TMJones
Summary: AU: Yugi, the local scapegoat at Domino High, finds that there is much more to the new student, Yami, than it seems. Between old enemies, ghosts, and an ancient cursed necklace, Yugi gets caught in the middle of a mysterious past that isn't even his own.
1. Midget Man

A/N: I know that this story is somewhat long--and that it's taken me forever to finish it.

But if you're willing to read so many chapters, then by all means--dive in.

I promise it's not that boring. :-D

Chapter One: Midget Man

* * *

A throng of teenagers—mostly junior boys—were gathered in the front hallway of Domino High, having a few laughs before homeroom. They weren't extremely intelligent. Brought together through their love of sports, most of them were on the football team, and the rest were either friends of the players, or fans. Their sense of humor was almost identical, and they laughed as one whenever one of them recited a joke. Almost all of these were directed at people at school, some of whom heard their supposedly comical faults as they walked by. Some glared at the group, while others just ignored them. Some people got more noise from the group than others. 

But the one that evoked the most laughs was another junior, with spiked hair that fanned out from his head, dyed red at the ends, and with bleached bangs. He was extremely short; almost two thirds the height of most of the group, and as he passed by, he seemed to shrink even more as the jeers started.

"I think the elementary school's across the street!"

"Yeah, Starhead!"

"Come back when your voice drops!"

They boy walked by silently, as the peals of laughter followed him. It was what he always did. They died away soon enough, as he made his way to homeroom down the hall. When he got there he went to the back corner of the room, next to the window, and set his enormous backpack down.

He had stopped using his locker ages ago—someone always put something in it. It was as if people knew exactly when he had valuable things in there and when he didn't, because he never found anything vile in it now. He checked every once in a while, too, to reassure himself that the people watching him were still on their toes—to see what he was up against.

Everyone had an eye out for when Yugi Motou was vulnerable for another prank.

He sat down. He was always the first one in the room, besides the teacher--though Mrs. LeGrange might as well not have been there. She never said anything before or during homeroom; she just counted the students, and if one wasn't there, she walked over to their seat, stared at it, and scoured the room for them. Her glare, wrinkled and lethal, was enough to make the class never stray from their assigned seats.

When she was done, she would sit back down and scowl at her student's papers, wielding her red pen across them as often as one breathes. And so Yugi sat, preparing himself for another completely boring homeroom by pulling out the latest book he was reading.

The rest of the students drizzled in, in about the same order they always did. Yugi didn't have to watch them anymore; he knew everyone's voices by ear, and what kind of movements they made. He had discovered that it was very easy to discern someone by the way they sound when they walk. It usually matched their personality, too, in some way. Sam's was quick, and efficient. Julie Bates' was slow, but accurate. Julie Brooks' was sloppy, but it got to the place it needed to. Michael's just never got there at all.

And then there was another kind of footstep. Yugi didn't recognize it at all. He didn't recognize the voice, either, as it said,

"Are you Mrs. LeGrange?"

"Yes," Mrs. LeGrange croaked back. The bell rang, and everyone went to their seats. When things had settled down, Mrs. Le Grange wheezed to the class, "We have a new student today. It says here your name is Yami. Is there anything else you'd like to be called?"

"No, Yami's fine, thanks."

Mrs. LeGrange slowly scritched a note in her attendance book.

"I'll be your homeroom teacher for the rest of the time you're here at Domino High. I'll put you back there, next to Yugi. It'd make taking attendance much easier for me. Now I have a nice square to work with, see?"

"Thank you, Mrs. LeGrange." Yami said.

As he made his way to the back of the room, Yugi created an image in his mind of what this new kid looked like. His voice was very deep and confident, and he was polite. His footstep reinforced that; it was a steady, assured walk. Yugi figured that he was tall, and by the girls' whispers that were following him, Yugi guessed that they thought he was good-looking. When Yami sat down, Yugi looked up from his book—and had to hide his surprise.

He was _short_! No one with that kind of footstep was short! Granted, Yami wasn't as short as Yugi (then Yugi would be downright scared), but he was a good head shorter than the average guy. And his hair! It was Yugi's hair, almost down to the last drop of dye. Well--Yugi assumed it was dye, because even though his own hair naturally grew this way, it was a freakish way for hair to grow. Now he understood what all the whispering was about.

Yami pointed to him and said,

"You're Yugi, right?"

"…Yeah….Hi," Yugi replied, looking this Yami person over. He had been right about the physical build, anyway…the guy looked pretty strong. And tough.

Wonderful. Another athlete to join the throng in the front hallway. And if not there, he'd find a place somewhere among the numerous groups of bullies that swarmed around this place. Yugi went back to his book.

As soon as Mrs. LeGrange sat down at her desk, Jenny the cheerleader turned in her seat to face Yami. Yugi listened to the conversation not out of an actual desire to, but because Jenny's voice was of the kind that could pierce through just about anything--including Yugi's focus.

"Hey," she said, "What'd you say your name was again?"

"Yami."

"That means 'dark', right?"

"Yeah."

"Does…mysterious come with that?"

"Um…"

"So, Yami, what's your schedule?"

Yugi heard some crinkling of paper.

"I'm taking… World History, Algebra II, PE, and German."

"Wow, you're smart! I'm in Algebra I because I failed it the first time." Then Jenny laughed—if you could call it that; to Yugi it sounded more like a horse.

"Ah," Yami said.

Yugi found it extremely exciting that he got to spend the first half of his day with Yami; he had World History and Algebra II as well. Then he went to Genetics and Spanish. Jenny made more conversation, and Yugi tried (and failed) to read more in his book.

Soon, the bell rang. Yugi hauled his backpack onto his shoulder, and was about to walk up the aisle when he felt a tap on his shoulder. Yami was standing behind him, looking somewhat confused.

"Hey, um—do you know where room 104 is?" He asked. Near the door, Yugi could hear some of the girls in their homeroom whispering and giggling amongst themselves about Yami's looks. Did they think they couldn't be heard?

"Yeah," Yugi replied, turning to Yami, "It's my next class."

"Cool."

Personally, Yugi didn't see anything 'cool' about it., but he led Yami there, anyway. All the guys in there would probably start talking to him, and Yugi would have one more bully to contend with by the end of the period—one that looked like he could get pretty mean, if he wanted to.

Utter joy filled Yugi's heart.


	2. World History

For all those who left reviews: Thank you.

Chapter Two: World History

* * *

Yami followed the short kid—he was horrible with names—through all kinds of turns and hallways before they wound up in an older part of the building; the walls were suddenly brick, and the rooms were smaller and more weathered. Yami knew he would be lost for at least the rest of the week; directions were another thing he was horrible with. Luckily, they were on a block schedule, so he only had four classes to try and get to. 

Though personally, Yami thought that was way too much time to spend in one class; he was so used to the standard six periods to a day that this four-period stuff just confused him. He was hoping the teachers were all right; he wouldn't want an hour and a half of each day to be spent dealing with a teacher he didn't like.

And Yami hoped that there were less girls like that one in homeroom. Not that there was anything wrong with her; she'd seemed very strange, to him...

Yami blinked, and quickened his pace to catch up with the kid leading him to class. Why was it that short people always walked more quickly? Yami could only see a head and legs sticking out from his enormous backpack, as Yami followed behind him. He didn't say anything the whole way there.

When they got to World History, the guy didn't respond to Yami's thanks—though he did pause for a moment, before shuffling off to his seat, eyes on the floor.

Yami walked to the teacher's desk, and waited as the bell rang, and the teacher yelled at the class to settle down in their seats. He was a tall, thin man, with a head of brown hair that would have been full, had he been a little younger. He had glasses that were relatively stylish in the world of high school faculty, and what looked like a rubber lizard sticking out of his shirt pocket. When he noticed Yami, he looked him up and down.

"Hello," he said.

"Hi," Yami replied, not quite sure what to do.

"Do you have a schedule?"

Yami pulled the already wrinkled schedule out of his back pocket, and handed it over.

"All right," the teacher pulled an orange marker out from behind his ear, and scribbled next to his class on the paper, "Welcome to the class, Mr. A…ooh." The teacher frowned at Yami's last name, and held the schedule out at arm's length.

"Could you pronounce that for me?"

"Atemuryoku."

"...Ah."

"Yeah, it's kind of complicated," Yami said.

"Well," the teacher handed the schedule back, "Luckily for you, I'm just Mr. Dither. Now, I think there's an empty desk there next to the window—yes, there behind Jim. Jim, raise your hand so we can remember who you are."

A kid with broad shoulders and small eyes raised his hand. Yami walked over and sat down, feeling (again) the eyes of every girl in class on him. Mr. Dither pulled a piece of chalk out of his jeans pocket and started to lecture, while Yami promptly sat down, slouched back, and tuned out. He knew all this already; that's what his last test had been on, before he moved.

Instead, he did something far more interesting that always killed the time; he watched people. He found that one could learn a lot more about a person if one watched them interact with their friends classmates than just speaking to them personally. This wasn't to say Yami didn't like to talk to people; he just liked to get more than one perspective on things. Although to Yami's disappointment, this class was pretty well-behaved; everyone was either sleeping or actually listening.

Everyone except the short kid Yami had met in homeroom. This time, he was sitting diagonally in front of Yami, on his right, and again, he was absorbed in that book. Yami wondered what it was. From what he could see of the illustrations over the guy's shoulder, it was some kind of strategy guide for a game. As quietly as he could, Yami straightened in his seat and started to lean forward, trying to see what kind…

"Psst."

Yami turned to see that Jim, the kid in front of him, had turned around.

"So where you from?" He asked.

"...What do you mean?"

Jim shrugged. "Where'd you move from?"

"The next school district." Yami replied blankly.

"What school were you at before?"

"Dalton."

"Oh. Never heard of it before."

"It's not that big," Yami said.

"Is it private?"

"No. Just really small."

"Hey, Midget!" Yami turned to see the guy next to him flicking the short kid in the back. "Dat a good book?"

The short kid didn't answer.

"You heahd me Midget," the guy next to Yami said, jabbing him again. Jim snickered.

Yami just raised an eyebrow.

"Hey, Jim—what's dat book called?" Jim lifted up the half of the book closest to him.

"It's a Duel Monsters strategy guide!"

Both Jim and his friend started laughing as silently as they could. The short kid remained still, and silent--as though no one had said anything at all.

Yami frowned slightly; that certainly was a strange reaction...

"Hey, Joey!"

The kid next to Yami looked up.

"Yeah?"

"Tell me what Mussolini did in the first World War."

Joey sat up in his seat and cleared his throat importantly. Then, with a serious face he said,

"He invented a new kind of noodle. It would have been named aftah him, but when it gaht exportahd to different countries, dey renamed it Tortellini."

The class laughed half-heartedly. Mr. Dither looked over his glasses at Joey.

"If I hear a comment like that tomorrow, you're getting moved."

"Aw, come on, Mr. Dithah!"

"Much as I enjoy having you here, Joey, I don't want to teach the same class to you twice."

Joey slumped in his seat. Mr. Dither looked around at the rest of the class.

"Does anyone else know the answer to my question?"

Yami raised his hand.

"New Kid!"

"Wasn't Mussolini in World War II?"

"Look at that!" Mr. Dither exclaimed, looking at the clock, "He's been in my class for forty-five minutes, and he already knows what I'm talking about!"

Then he did a double take.

"Oh! Speaking of time, I need to wrap up this here for today—remind me where I am tomorrow, someone—Because you need to know about your Final Projects!"

The class groaned.

"Well, if you'd rather take a final," Mr. Dither said, shrugging, "I could just use the handouts I printed this morning for scratch paper, or something."

The class went silent.

"That's what I thought. Now, hang on while I find those handouts…"

Mr. Dither walked over to his desk, and started rummaging through the stacks of paper on top. Every once in a while, he would unearth something completely unexpected, such as a rubber duck, or a marble.

"Is there any reason why he has a bunch of toys in his desk?" Yami asked aloud.

"I dunno," Joey replied. "He's one 'a those weahd teachers. Cool, but weahd. I don't think anyone knows why he keeps 'em heah. He doesn't use 'em in his lektchahs…"

"Lectures, you mean?" Yami asked.

"Hey, I don't see anyone makin' fun of your accent," Joey said, narrowing his eyes at Yami.

"That's because he doesn't have one," Jim said.

"Everyone has an accent! Mine is just…unique."

"And besides, I wasn't making fun of it," Yami said, "I was just trying to understand what you were saying."

"What!"

Jim snickered again.

"Joey!"

"Sorry, Mr. Dithah…"

"Why don't you help me hand out the rubric?"

Joey got up, and headed to the front of the room.

"And while he's doing that," Mr. Dither continued, "I'm going to announce your groups."

"You mean we don't get ta choose?" Joey asked.

"You're going to work in teams of two, and there's going to be one team of three—wait, now there won't. New Kid, you made the class even!" Mr. Dither exclaimed, pulling his marker out from behind his ear again and scribbling a change on the paper in his hands.

"Okay—These are how the groups now stand…" He started naming off names. Joey was relieved to be paired with Jim.

"…and I've put Yugi with Yami."

"Ooh," Joey said under his breath, sitting back down, "Tough luck."

Yami didn't say anything. Not surprisingly, neither did Yugi.

The bell rang.

"Okay, everyone!" Mr. Dither shouted over the scuffle of backpacks and books, "I want you to look over the rubric tonight, and we'll go over any questions you have about it in class tomorrow!"

Yami put the rubric inside his empty binder, and pulled out his schedule again.

"Does anyone know where room 144 is?" he asked no one in particular.

* * *

A/N: Poor Joey—never got out of the bully habit of his.

And if that accent is too painful for people to read (or if, like Yami, you can't understand it,) just tell me. I tried to imitate a New York accent, but….I've never heard anyone in person talk like this, so I'm relying solely on his voice from the show.


	3. The Way Things Are

Chapter Three: The Way Things Are

* * *

The period was relatively short, for Yugi. He got through chapter four in his book, and had just enough time to take in Mr. Dither's scribbles on the board as he packed up and left. By the looks of it, he had already read it all in the chapters Mr. Dither had assigned them to read ages ago. Yugi never got that; why was it that teachers had you read something, and then turn around and go over it, word for word, in class? Why not vary it a little? It'd make him less bored, anyway… 

It had seemed odd to Yugi that Yami kid had actually been polite to him. He had said thank you to Yugi—something people at school hadn't said to him since… Yugi couldn't remember the last time someone other than a teacher had bee polite. He doubted there was a last time to remember. Then again, it had been quite a long time since anyone new had come into the school, either—two years, to be exact.

Yugi remembered that last kid, too. He had been nice to Yugi, in the beginning. But, he had gotten singled out soon enough, and had started getting treated like Yugi. The kid had put up with harassment for a while. He told Yugi it was the right thing to do, and that he wouldn't let a bunch of bullies tell him who to be friends with. Somehow, Yugi didn't believe him.

And he was right, in the end; one can only put up with so many bruises, and verbal abuse. The kid had finally gotten sick of it, and had told Yugi why he couldn't hang out with him anymore.

Of course, Yugi understood. It hurt a little, but he understood why. He got over it soon enough. The kid moved away a couple weeks later, anyway—it would have been pointless to make a big fuss about it.

This guy would come to understand, too, how things worked around here. Yugi could see the whole scenario now—he's nice to Yugi at first. But then everyone else comes along to harass him, and he makes friends with them to stop the fists from coming.

Yugi sat down in his math class seat, and took out his binder. By the looks of him, Yugi gathered that Yami would last a little longer than the other kid. It might even take the rest of the year for him to see. But… things would fall into place, in the end. Yugi sighed, and opened to the first clean sheet of paper. It was just how things were. It was pathetic, yes—but Yugi had gotten used to it. People didn't matter, anyway.

Yugi liked Algebra II; it was the only one he never had to read in. Every day, Mrs. Robertson threw some new curve at the students that wasn't quite how the book worded it, or she taught it differently. It was an easy challenge. Yugi always got the answers right, no matter if it was from the book or not. But he had to actually listen to Mrs. Robertson to do it—and he liked that.

Today was another chapter from the book. But Mrs. Robertson had decided that this one and chapter 14 were really similar, so she threw the two together, despite their being at opposite ends of the book. Yugi liked that, too; she jumped around a lot. She was unpredictable.

About halfway through the lesson, Yugi looked behind him, to see who was whispering—he guessed it was Reese and Jennah, but he turned around, just to make sure. Yep. Who else would be debating the greatness of the latest chick flick? Jennah could get so attached to those kinds of movies. Reese just didn't get it at all. But Yugi thought that, deep down, he liked going to them. He liked arguing with her about them, anyway.

Sometimes, Yugi wondered how aware people were of the fact that Yugi actually existed, and could hear and understand just about every mediocre happening that went on around him. Whether it was out of boredom or an actual desire to get to know other people from a distance, Yugi seemed to have developed over the years a knack for the art of observing without being observed. If that made any sense...

He also noticed that Yami was there, in the back corner. He didn't seem to like math all that much; that was the most confused face Yugi had seen on him yet. Granted, it was his first day, but still—Yugi had the feeling he didn't look like that often. His face didn't look accustomed to it. Yugi turned back around.

There was Jill, in the front row. Now Jill always looked confused. Maybe she and Yami would get together, sometime. Well… if they ever noticed each other.

"Yugi!" Mrs. Robertson called, "would you like to come up and do problem number seven for us?"

Yugi got up, and (as usual) got everything right. It had gotten to the point where he was scrutinizing the neatness of his writing as he worked the problems—the problem itself seemed to fall into place on its own. Mrs. Robertson thanked him, and he went back to his seat, hearing her explaining to the rest of the baffled class what he had just done.

Things were pretty sleepy after that. She just lectured some more, and Yugi only half-listened, comparing his writing with the other problems that were written on the board after him, as Mrs. Robertson went over the rest of the homework.

After a while, Yugi went back to observing people in the classroom. People were starting to fall asleep in the systematic, exacting atmosphere of math. Shame. Now Yugi was bored.

But not enough to pull out his book. Mrs. Robertson probably would have asked him about it after class, as he never read in there.

And so when the bell rang, Yugi hauled his backpack onto his shoulder again and walked out to the sounds of students waking up—and that Yami guy asking where the gym was. He hoped they were doing that lab in Genetics; it would be nice if he didn't have to read in there, too...


	4. Heritage

Chapter Four: Heritage

* * *

Yami walked out of Algebra feeling quite blown away. He didn't recognize anything they had gone over—and for him, that was _really_ bad. Math was one of the supreme evils of the world, in Yami's book. It never liked him, and he had given up on trying to get to know it better a long time ago. 

He was thankful for his next class; Gym couldn't be bad, could it? It was easy enough; it usually involved a ball of some kind, and a lot of people either kicking, hitting, or throwing it to each other. And balls liked him; they didn't try to trip him up, or trick him with all that logic. They just sat there, waiting for you to do something to it before the other team got a hold of it.

Thankfully he had known he was taking gym beforehand, and had prepared himself; he had grabbed his old school's gym clothes when he had left the house that morning, as they had miraculously stayed afloat through the move. And by the looks of things, as Yami entered the locker room, there wasn't much of a difference between how gym was run at Dalton, and how it was run at Domino. Yami sat down on one of the benches, put his binder into the locker next to it, and started to change.

It was hard to imagine that he had been saying goodbye to everyone back at Dalton only last week…it hadn't been much of a move. But it was enough of one that he wouldn't be able to see everyone from his old school all the time. They were in a different school district now, and on a completely different schedule. They wouldn't even have any sports games together, unless they had to compete in finals. Still, it wasn't like he was zillions of miles away, or anything. He should be thankful for that.

Yami heard the slap of a binder against the bench next to him, and the locker next to his got wrenched open. It was Jim, from World History.

"Hi," he said, hurriedly yanking his shoes off.

"Late?" Yami asked.

"Yeah, a little."

"There ya are, Jim! Did Mr. Rechsteineh hold ya late again?" Yami looked up and saw Joey, already dressed out. He didn't say anything.

"No," Jim said quickly, yanking his gym shirt over his head, "Rae wanted to talk to me."

"What about?" another guy asked, walking up next to Joey. He was already dressed, too.

"Oh," Jim said dismissively. Yami noticed he was blushing a little, "Nothing much."

"Yeah, right!" Joey said, sitting down on the bench next to Jim. "If you didn't ask her, I'm gonna have ta do somethin' to ya, because it's been _way_ too long—"

"I didn't have to," Jim interrupted, tying his shoe. "She asked _me_ out."

"Oho!" the other guy said.

"Man…you're lucky," Joey said, "If I tried ta pull that with Mai, she woulda left."

"You wouldn't have had time to not ask," the other guy said.

"'zactly," Joey agreed, getting up heading towards the locker room doorway.

They all walked out into the gym, Jim hopping after them as he struggled to get his shoe tied. He failed, and fell flat on his face just outside the locker room. There was a scattering of laughter, and Jim got up, smiling himself.

"Haskins!" Barked a voice. Yami saw a middle-aged, muscular man walk over to the crowd of boys. Jim stumbled from them, back straight.

"Yes, Coach?"

"Get the equipment."

"Right," Jim said, taking off at a jog.

"Today," Coach said, addressing the rest of the boys and the girls that were filing out of their locker room. "We're going to start our unit on basketball. I explained what's going to be happening yesterday. And if you didn't remember, too bad. We'll start separate for today and tomorrow, then coed for the tournament. Girls on the left, boys on the right. You know your teams." He then blew his whistle. Yami stayed where he was, feeling a little awkward as everyone immediately scattered, each heading towards one of the four basketball hoops in the room.

"You!" Yami turned towards the coach. "What's your name?"

"Yami."

"Is that what it says on your birth certificate?"

"Yami Atemuryoku," Yami corrected.

Coach blinked. "That's quite the name."

"Yeah."

"All right, Yami…" Coach said, looking around at the now silent gym. Everyone was lined up in rows, two rows to each hoop. "You're with Honda's group, over here." He pointed to the team nearest to them, at the head of which was the guy who had been behind Joey in the locker room. Yami walked over, and stood at the end of the line next to a slightly overweight, black-haired kid. Jim rolled a rack of basketballs out to the center of the room, then ran over and stood next to Yami.

Yami said, and watched as one person from each court got a ball, and walked back to their court. Coach blew the whistle, and the basketballs flew.

There were enough people who could actually play on each team that the game was interesting. Yami was pretty good, he soon found—all those summer evenings in the basketball courts with Bakura and his friends seemed to pay off. He found himself getting more and more into the game as the period went on. His team was a little behind, due to some kids not being able to dribble or shoot, but Yami would pass the ball to them, anyway—no one else was, and they seemed to get themselves in just the spot where Yami needed someone to be in to keep the ball on their team.

Still, the two teams ended up being tied, near the end of the game. And just as Jim had commented on the time, Yami caught the ball and shot, watching it fall cleanly through the hoop just as Coach blew the whistle. The cheers from Yami's team attracted some stares from the other three courts.

"All right everyone! Get the balls back, and I want the scores from each court! The rest of you get dressed."

And so, with half an hour of the period left, they all migrated back into the locker rooms.

"Man!" Jim said, when they got to the lockers, "That was the best game I've played in gym! You're trying out for the team, right?"

"I… wasn't thinking about it…" Yami replied. Was he _that_ good?

"You should," Jim said, "I could put in a good word for you, with Coach."

"You're on the team?"

"Yep. Coach has been talking about some new players; he's had basically the same team for three years, now. You're a Junior, right?"

"Yeah."

"Come to practice sometime."

"I'll think about it," Yami said, taking his gym shirt off. He pulled his other shirt out of the locker, and out of the corner of his eye, he saw Honda and Joey walking towards them.

"Your name's Yami, right?" Honda asked.

"Don't worry," Jim said, "I've already asked him."

"About the team?"

"Yeah."

"You're on it, too?" Yami asked Honda. Honda shook his head.

"I was, but I had to choose between that and soccer."

"So now he's an da team with me." Joey said.

"Ah," Yami said.

"Hey," Joey said, "What's that you're wearin'?"

"Clothes," Honda replied, giving Joey a weird look.

"Nat you! Yami."

"What?" Yami asked.

"Is that some kind 'a diamond shape…or pyramid?" Joey asked, tilting his head to the side and squinting at Yami's chest.

"Oh, this?" Yami said. He took hold of the fine gold chain, and held it up. A small pyramid, only about an inch tall, and so detailed that one could see the its individual blocks, was dangling from it. On the front, there was a large, pupil-less eye engraved into it (1). Yami shrugged.

"Just something my Dad gave me."

"Where'd he get it?" Jim asked, watching it twirl in the air

"Egypt originally," Yami said. He let it drop to his chest again, pulled his uniform shirt on.

"Did he visit there?" Honda asked.

"Well, my family's from there."

"Whoa! You're Egyptian?" Joey asked.

"Yeah."

"Dude! That's awesome!" Honda exclaimed.

"Do you speak any?" Jim asked eagerly. Yami shook his head.

"No."

"Do your parents speak it?" Honda asked.

"Not much. Only when my grandparents are over."

"Cool!" the three of them said simultaneously. Yami just pulled his shoe on. He was used to that reaction.. Nine times out of ten, the first thing people wanted to know after they found out he was Egyptian was if he could speak the language. The truth was, he didn't see enough of his grandparents to pick up any of the words, and his parents never spoke it at home. He couldn't think of an Egyptian word if he tried. Still, Jim, Joey, and Honda seemed impressed. People usually were.

He left the locker room listening to Joey talking to Jim about his first date, and was led by Honda up to the language wing, where they split—Honda went off to French, and Yami started the search for the room number 231.

It didn't take long; it was right in front of the stairway leading back down to the first floor. Plus, there was a large German flag draped over the door. Even if he wasn't looking for it, the German classroom would be hard to miss. He opened the door, and walked in.

Posters were everywhere. Yami could barely see the wall as he walked over to the teacher's desk, and handed her his schedule. Everything from soccer players to maps stared back at him, all drenched in black, red, and a dark yellow.

The teacher was an older woman, and very German in her features and complexion. She sounded as if she had lived in the country a while, but it was still apparent that she had lived most of her life in a German-speaking country.

"Oh, a new student!" She said, taking his schedule, and looking at it. "How do you pronounce your last name?"

"Atemuryoku."

"Oh, I like that!" the teacher said, "Do you know if it's from anywhere?"

"It's Egyptian."

"Ah, so you're Egyptian?"

"My family is. I've never been there, or anything."

"Still, that's very interesting. You'll have to introduce yourself to the class, once everyone's here…" She signed the schedule with a large red pen, and made a note of it next to Yami's name.

"I know I didn't get my gym teacher to sign it—"

"Don't worry," she said, waving a hand, "no one really looks at this anyway. In fact you'll probably want to keep it?"

"Yeah," Yami agreed, very thankful. He had been wondering how he was going to remember where all he had been that day.

"So, where were you taking German before?"

"Dalton High School."

"I think I've heard of it," the teacher said, "it's part of that split school?"

"Yeah; Dalton is the all-boy's half."

"I see. This must be different for you then, being with boys _and_ girls."

"Yeah, it's a little different." Yami agreed. He found that she was very easy to talk to.

The bell rang. Yami looked around at the class, and noticed that it was relatively small. The atmosphere in the room seemed very friendly and welcoming, too.

"Guten Tag, Klasse!" the teacher said, walking out from behind her desk, and sitting on the stool that stood in the front of the room. "We have a new student today who just came to us from Dalton High School." She then turned to Yami.

"Ich HeiBe Frau Mueller. Wie HeiBt du?" (2)

"Yami Atemuryoku," Yami replied.

"Ah! Seine Familie ist von Ägypten," she announced to the class, pronouncing everything slowly and clearly.

"That's Egypt, right?" a guy in the back corner called out.

"Michael," Frau Mueller said, "You know that."

"I was testing everyone," Michael said, grinning. Frau smiled, and shook her head.

"Wie alt bist du, Yami?"

"Sechzehn," Yami said. "Wait—that's sixteen, right? Not sixty?"

Frau nodded. "I'd be very surprised if you were sixty, though. You must have a lot of surgeries, right? Get rid of all the wrinkles?"

"Yeah," Yami said.

"Well, Yami," Frau Mueller said, looking around the classroom, "You can sit anywhere you like, and I'll catch you up on what we've been learning so far at the end of class, okay?"

"All right," Yami said. He walked straight ahead, and sat down next to a girl with longish brown hair, and large blue eyes.

He knew everything Frau Mueller was talking about in her lecture. She explained things so clearly, though, that he probably would have gotten it even he hadn't' known. The class all seemed to know each other fairly well, and inside jokes flew across the room as often as German did. It made Yami feel somewhat lost, but not in that hopeless way that Algebra induced.

Before anyone realized it, the bell was about to ring, and everyone was packing their things up.

And as Yami walked out of the classroom, hand full of handouts from Frau Mueller, he decided that he liked Domino High. It was different, but… so was any new place.

* * *

(1) Picture eye of the millennium puzzle engraved into an inch-tall pyramid, and that's about it. 

(2) I don't know what the double s would translate into on the internet, so I'm just going to use a capital B.

A/N: Basketball players, you can laugh at me; I used to play, but it was a long while ago. My brain's very fuzzy on the lingo, and rules, and such. And this is assuming I learned them in the first place.

(EDIT: 12/31/04: Thank you, Sansi, for the correction; it has been edited in. I've only been learning the language for a short while, so I need all the help I can get.)


	5. Why?

Chapter Five: Why?

* * *

World History started as it had for the past three days. Mr. Dither announced the schedule for that period to a deaf crowd, as the class was focused on the jerky movements of the red rubber lizard tail that stuck out of Mr. Dither's front pocket. It jiggled back and forth as he rambled on, hypnotizing the more gullible of the class. 

Yami was staring out the window. He considered it a smart move, as he liked to retain what he heard. He had to wonder, though, if Mr. Dither kept the lizard there out of amusement; Yami could only imagine what a class full of dazed high school students looked like from the front.

The past few days had gone by smoothly, for Yami. He could find the way to his classes, and he had begun to understand (somewhat) what his teachers had gone over during the first part of the semester. He thought he pretty much had the hang of classes, and he had made a few acquaintances already. That girl that sat next to him in German was nice. If Yami could retain her name for more than the five seconds after she told him, that'd be even better. Jim, Joey and Honda all thought he was all right, and he was scheduled to come to basketball practice that Friday, as a sort of a tryout.

He still didn't know what to think of those three...

"Everyone got that?" Mr. Dither said, and Yami turned his attention to the front of the class again. They muttered some kind of jumble in reply, which Mr. Dither obviously took as a yes.

"All right then—to your groups!"

Everyone started shuffling around, looking for their partners for their final project. The room was filled with desks getting moved, and people talking. Yami moved into Jim's assigned seat, and turned his desk towards Yugi's.

Yugi looked very interested in that strategy guide that Jim and Joey had teased him about, on Yami's first day. He personally didn't find it as funny as Jim and Joey had. He didn't find it funny at all, actually; strategy guides came in quite useful, sometimes, if they were written well…

"So," he said, pulling out his copy of the rubric. "the project."

Yugi didn't say anything. Yami leaned forward slightly, hoping the movement would bring him back to the classroom. When that failed, he eyed where he thought Yugi was reading, and waved his hand over the paragraph. Yugi started, and looked up.

"Oh!… Groups!" he exclaimed, a little dazedly.

"Yeah," Yami said.

Yugi shut the book, and put it on the corner of his desk, shaking his head. "I didn't hear Mr. Dither going over the homework…"

"He didn't," Yami replied, "he just started talking about the whole group thing. He handed out a timeline," Yami pulled his out from his binder. Yugi started looking for his.

"…It's in your book," Yami said; he recognized the heading sticking out from between the pages. Yami pulled it out, while keeping his place. "Wow," he muttered, "I must have been pretty into it; I don't even remember passing this back..."

"What is that, anyway?" Yami asked, leaning forward to look at the title. The words, "Duel Monsters" were printed on the front.

"Oh, yeah—I've seen that one."

Yugi seemed surprised.

"You actually know what it _is_?" He asked.

"Yeah," Yami replied, "My Dad's into that kind of thing. He tried to get me hooked to card games when I was younger. Didn't work out, though."

"What happened?"

"I stared at the illustrations too much, instead of paying attention."

"Heh," Yugi laughed. He then squinted thoughtfully at the book. "I never thought of that."

"Thought of what?"

"Looking at the art."

"Well," Yami said, shrugging, "_Somebody_ had to draw it…"

"Yeah," Yugi agreed, tearing off a corner of the timeline and using it for a bookmark. "I guess someone did."

"Anyway," Yami said, looking over the sheet, "So this is the rest of the semester?"

"Outside of class, yeah."

Yami looked up.

"You mean, we're going to be doing all the regular stuff in here, too?"

"Yeah," Yugi said, glancing over the sheet, "It's in that top paragraph."

"Oh…" Yami frowned at it. That wasn't good at all…

"Overloaded?" Yugi asked. "Mrs. Robertson is hard to get used to, if you like order."

"I know," Yami said, exasperated. "I don't know how I'm going to survive in there… Half the stuff I don't even know--wait..."

Yugi had pulled out his history textbook, and had been flipping through the pages. He now stopped his search, looking up at Yami through a pair of eerie, purple eyes.

"How do you know what class I have?"

"I'm in it." Yugi replied promptly, not even so much as blinking.

"Oh…" Yami blinked, and frowned. "I don't remember you yesterday…were you there?"

"Yeah," Yugi replied lightly, going back to the textbook. "I wrote number seven on the board."

"…Oh." Yugi felt a twinge of embarrassment. Then, in a desperate attempt to save himself from the social blunder, he said, "Oh! That's right…seven…"

But Yugi just shook his head.

"Don't bother."

"…What?" Yami said, feigning ignorance.

"You're not the first one."

The statement so odd to Yami that he couldn't think of a response right away, and scanned distractedly over the rubric instead.

"Hey, Midget," came a voice. Yami looked up, and saw Joey and Jim on either side of Yugi. Yugi's expression went suddenly blank. "What's wrong?" Joey asked, noticing the movement. "You're not happy to see me?"

Yugi was silent.

"Hey, Jim," Joey said, nodding to the strategy guide, "It's that Duel Monsters book again. Why haven't you finished it yet, Yugi? Did you actually _talk _to someone?"

"Yeah," Jim chimed in, "He's behind two chapters because it disturbed him."

"He's already disturbed…" Joey said, and had begun to say something else when Mr. Dither stared making his way over to their side of the classroom.

"Joey! Jim!" He said, stopping next to Yami, "I suggest you stop talking and get to work."

"But we _are_ talking about our work," Jim said.

"If you need anything cleared up, you'll talk to me," Mr. Dither stated sternly, looking over his glasses at them. After a moment, Joey and Jim started to return to their seats. When they'd turned away, Mr. Dither left.

Yugi was perfectly still. He was staring at a spot on his desk, and his hands were in his lap.

"E—erm…" Yami tried to say.

But the silence between them was too awkward to break. The bell rung shortly after. Yami went to get his things, intending to talk to Yugi on the way to math—but Yugi seemed to vanish the instant it started ringing.

* * *

For the all of Algebra II, the only part of Yugi that moved was his hand, as it scratched out what Mrs. Robertson wrote on the board. And Yami had no choice but to try and hold on to the only clue he had, copying down symbols and numbers he didn't even follow—he didn't have much time to observe things, much as he would have liked to. He really didn't feel like concentrating on his work.

Why was it that Jim and Joey didn't like Yugi? And why had Yugi seemed so… different when they had come over? Although now that Yami thought about it, that hadn't been the first time he had seen Yugi do that. It had just been from a distance that he had seen it before; a length of a hallway, a desk row over… every time someone started talking to him, Yugi's expression would suddenly become blank, and he'd barely say a word. He'd just stare at a spot on the floor, letting the words wash over him. When the person had sneered and walked off, Yugi would look up, and move on.

But the thing that really confused Yami was how Yugi had reacted to Yami's stupidity. _"Don't bother"_, he'd said.

Don't bother what? Trying to cover the fact that he didn't notice Yugi in class? Well…Yami _could_ have just blamed it on the fact that he'd only been at Domino for three days. But the situation had just seemed awkward to him. He should know who's in his classes…

"_You're not the only one."_

He wasn't the only that didn't notice him? Is that what that had meant? If so…Yami shook his head. He didn't know what to think.

And what was he to think of Joey and Jim? He had gotten along with the two of them, the first three days. What could Yugi have he done to deserve that? Had he done anything at all? It didn't seem like he had. There was still that vague possibility, though, that he had hurt Jim or Joey in some way…

Yami shook his head, as he pulled his gym shoe on, in the locker room. Seeing what he had of Yugi, there was definitely something more to him than what met the eye. But Yami had the feeling that it wasn't the same thing that Jim and Joey hated him for.

Or did they really hate him at all? Did they just do it because everyone else was? Or was everyone else doing it because of them?

"Yami?"

Yami stood, and saw Jim sitting beside him, as he had done the past few days.

"You all right? You're glaring."

Yami shrugged, and shut his locker. "Just thinking."

"Ah," Jim replied distantly. He was still tying his shoe. Joey was trying to remember a joke someone had told him, but he kept going back on the details.

"Dude," Honda said, after a few agonizing moments, "You're annoying."

"I WILL tell that joke!" Joey claimed.

"You do that." Jim said. "Knowing you, though, it's probably not even that good."

"Hey!"

Honda and Jim laughed, a little.

"You all right, Yami?" Joey asked. "You're not saying much."

"He's thinking," Jim replied.

"Thinking? You look like you're going to kill someone," Joey replied, looking again at Yami's expression. Yami relaxed his face, said it was nothing, and followed the three as they migrated out into the gym.

He could feel Coach watching him, throughout the entire tournament game of basketball—boys vs. girls. The boys won, but only by a couple of points. A lot of the girls' basketball team was on the girls' side, and Honda's team still had to deal with a few fumbling kids, whom Yami was sure were underclassmen. They still made it in the end, thought, and for a while, Yami forgot his thoughts.

They came right back, though, as Frau Mueller launched into her lecture on what the dative, accusative, and nominative forms were. She personalized them into stick people on the overhead, which Yami only partly paid attention to.

"Hey, Anzu?" Yami whispered.

"What?"

Yami paused to mentally celebrate; he had gotten the name right. "Do you know a kid named Yugi?"

"I've never seen him, but I've heard about him."

"What have you heard?"

"Well… lots of things. Everyone says he's a nerd, and he's antisocial. He hardly talks to anybody, and when he does, it's to teachers. He never does anything, except study and read. He doesn't have any friends, I've heard."

"Oh," Yami said. "That sounds depressing."

"Yeah," Anzu agreed. "I'd be surprised if it were true, though."

"Hm," Yami replied. He then looked at the drawing on the overhead. One stick figure was holding something, and red spots were around it. The second figure was on the ground, dead. The third was off to the side, holding a suitcase. Yami raised his hand.

"Why is Norman holding a q-tip?"

"That's a knife!" Frau Mueller exclaimed, feigning insult. The class burst into laughter. "He's killing Axel for David! See? Nominative, Accusative, and Dative!"

"That'd be some pretty nasty earwax," someone else said. Meanwhile, Frau was laughing.

And amidst the chaos that ensued due to Frau Mueller's pause in her lecture, Yami wondered just how possible it was for a human being to be as invisible as Yugi and the others seemed to think Yugi was...


	6. Looney Midget?

A/N: I have mellowed down Joey's accent. He'll still have his little episodes, but they won't be nearly as illegible as they were when Yami first met him.

Chapter Six: Looney Midget?

* * *

Yugi didn't know what to think. And that was a hard realization to swallow. 

After all, this almost never happened. He always knew what was coming, and what to think of it. Whether he was just attuned to look for patterns or whether they were so painfully obvious he couldn't possibly miss them, he didn't know anymore. But the fact remained that he always could predict quite well what would happen, whether it was in his classes, his homework assignments, the plotlines of the books he read, how an evening was going to be with Grandpa…just by the subtle clues that fell out of his surroundings and into his consciousness. It was no superhuman power, by any stretch of the mind.

Yugi supposed it helped, that Domino was a thriving mass of monotonous teenagers. He didn't see any kind of color, or diversity among them. Maybe it was because he didn't look for it. Maybe it was because it was never shown to him. He didn't really know, anymore. He just knew that what he was seeing around him was the same thing he had been seeing for a very long time.

It was a realization that had hit him quite a while ago—somewhere around eighth grade, or so. Things just kind of settled down into the routine they still plunked out today, four years later. What was really strange to Yugi was that most people figured high school were the best years of your life. If this was the best… he couldn't wait for the future. No, really.

But there was one flaw in this philosophy of his. One spiky-haired wrench had been thrown into the system, offsetting a few well-oiled assumptions and generalizations Yugi had been using to interpret his life, up to this point.

It had been a simple conversation, to Yami. Yugi could tell it was nothing more than his attempts at getting to know his partner for the final project a little bit better than he did when he first sat down.

But when you couldn't remember the last time you had had a decent, civilized conversation with anyone other than Grandpa, it skewed things a bit. You started seeing things much more differently than the average person, and that soon took its toll. Personally, Yugi was starting to think he was a little off his rocker, so to speak.

Yugi tried to figure out how long it would take for Yami to walk down that same path the other kid had—the kid that had tried to become his friend, freshman year. He had estimated about the rest of the year, before… he thought that was a good assumption. He wouldn't come right up and tell Yugi, either. Yugi figured he'd just drift away, until they were nothing more than two students that went to the same school. Senior year would sweep Yami up, and he'd leave the antisocial bookworm nerd far behind.

It was one of those gut feeling predictions, Yugi thought, as he corrected a problem on his homework in Math class. He couldn't lay any solid fact on it, but he just knew that's how things were going to turn out, in the end. It's the way things always did.

He'd enjoy Yami's company while the time lasted, though. He had enjoyed talking to him about Duel Monsters, even if it was just about the art on the cards. The fact remained that Yami had known what it was. And he hadn't laughed at Yugi because of it—it had been quite different from what Yugi was used to.

He hadn't meant to upset him, either, when Yami hadn't remembered Yugi from math class. He was just stating the obvious—apparently, Yami had taken it a little differently than Yugi saw it. Or maybe he had taken it the same way, and was just shocked by it. But Yugi couldn't imagine why that would be… then again, he didn't know what the average person thought of his situation.

He felt like a psychological complex, sometimes. He knew his perceptions of the life swirling around him were warped. He couldn't help it— the world that shaped his didn't pay enough attention to him, and when it did, it was only to give him a strange look while walking down the hallway. Or to tease him. So it was only natural to take on their opinion.

It _was_ theirs…

Right?


	7. The OneSided Willow

Chapter Seven: The One-Sided Willow

* * *

"Psst." Yami tapped Joey on the shoulder. 

"What?"

"Get Yugi for me."

Joey gave Yami a funny look, but hit Yugi in the back of the head anyway. Yami cringed inwardly; that's not exactly what he had meant…

Yugi turned around to give Joey a very blank stare. Joey jabbed a thumb in Yami's direction. His eyes shifted towards Yami just enough so Yami saw he had registered Joey's gesture. Nothing else moved.

Odd…

Yami shook his head a little, and leaned over in his desk.

"Are you doing anything after school today?" He whispered.

Yugi blinked.

Those eyes were starting to creep Yami out… they seemed to be way too large for a person his size. The silence drew out, supplemented by Mr. Dither's talking in the background. Finally—just when Yami was wondering if he was heard, or not—Yugi shook his head no, and blinked again.

"You think we'd be able to meet up somewhere and start on the project?" Yami asked.

Yugi blinked again.

"Dumb midget…." Joey muttered. A pair of violet pupils shifted to him again.

"What're _you_ lookin' at?" Joey snapped.

Another blank blink.

"So," Yami said, "Erm… where would you like to meet?"

The awkwardness of the situation pressed on him, and Yami could swear he could physically feel it on his hands, as they lay folded in the middle of his desktop. It didn't help that Yugi didn't give him an answer. After a while, Yami ventured to speak again.

"How about…" he cast about his mind for one of the few places he knew already, spitting out the place that came to his mind first; "The willow in the park?"

"The _what_?" Joey asked.

"You know, that willow—it's in that park right next to the school, near the track."

"You mean the one-sided willow?"

"What?" Yami asked, turning to Jim.

"The otha side got zapped off by a bolt of lightning, couple yeahs ago."

"oh," Yami said. "I didn't know that…"

"Bet ya didn't know it was—well… nevah mind." Joey stopped himself.

"What?" Yami pressed.

"Nothin'," Joey replied, a grin spreading across his face.

"What is it?"

…But Joey would say no more. Neither would Jim. And they both acted rather smug about it, which just spurred on Yami's curiosity—and annoyance. For a good twenty minutes he tried to squeeze it out of them, to no avail.

Then, he heard a voice say,

"All right."

"You're going to tell?" Yami asked, turning to Joey.

"That wasn't me, man."

"Huh?"

Yugi was looking at him again.

"I said 'all right'." He repeated, enunciating much more than he needed to. Yami could hear a tinge of annoyance in his voice.

"Oh!…Okay," he said, feeling strange; that was the second time he hadn't noticed Yugi. He really shouldn't make that a habit…

"R—right after school?" he asked. Yugi nodded slightly, and turned around in his seat again. Joey and Jim tried to hide their laughter.

"Man… you're evil," Jim snickered.

"What's evil?" Yami shot. "Is there something bad at the willow?"

"No," Jim replied, fighting to keep a straight face. It didn't last long at all; mere seconds later, he was laughing again—hard.

"There _is_ something bad at the willow," Yami stated.

"Ya might find _some_thin' theah—but it wouldn't be _bad_," Joey said, before breaking down into laughter like Jim's.

"I'm sure those involved in the Depression didn't find it that funny," Mr. Dither said loudly. "Joey!"

Joey straightened, controlling himself.

"Sorry, Mr. Dithah!"

Mr. Dither gave him a stern glare, before returning to the board. Yami pulled out a sheet of paper and started to copy the outline on the blackboard.

"What's so funny?" Honda asked, opening a locker near Yami's; Joey and Jim had suddenly started laughing out loud, for no apparent reason.

"If it has to do with that willow," Yami said, glowering, "I'll _will_ hurt you."

"You mean the One-Sided Willow?" Honda asked, looking from Yami to Joey and Jim. His eyes lit up, and he looked at Yami with a very amused expression.

"Whoa! That's—"

"SSH!" Joey hissed, throwing a rolled-up sock over Yami's head—it bounced off Honda's ear.

"What—Ick! Man, your socks are lethal!" He threw the sock back.

"You should talk," Joey said. "Anyway, we want Yami ta figyah it out an his own."

"Did someone want you to go there?" Honda asked Yami.

"Nope—it's even better," Jim said.

"Yeah; he's goin' ta do some work on Mr. Dithah's final praject theah!"

"_What?" _ Honda asked, shocked.

"Yeah!" Joey laughed.

"With _who?"_

"Can I _please_ know what this is about!?" Yami yelled.

"The _Midget_!" Joey said, ignoring Yami. Honda's eyes widened.

"You're kidding!"

"No, man," Joey said, "I heahd him ask Yugi with my own eahs."

Honda looked at Yami again, and burst out laughing.

Yami glared at them.What did they know?!

"That's almost not even funny!" Honda gasped.

"Then why are you laughing?" Yami snapped, slamming his locker shut.

"Man…that's evil," Honda finally managed to say, wiping his eyes.

"That's what Jim said!" Yami accused, looking between the three of them. _"What are you trying to pull?"_

"Nothin', we told ya," Joey said, putting on that smug smile on again.

"Fine—laugh! See if I care!" And with that angry outburst, Yami stormed out of the locker room amidst an awkward silence as Jim, Joey, and Honda all gave each other confused looks.

He'd get them for this_--_it was one of Yami's biggest pet peeves, having things kept from him and then rubbed in his face. _ Nobody_ did that to Yami like that without paying for it.

And so, Yami didn't talk to them for the rest of the period. He glowered at them enough so that they got the point—and a little more for good measure. By the end of gym, they were laughing a lot less and staring strangely at him more; obviously they didn't know it was going to bug him that much….

But they still didn't tell him. And just for that, Yami resolved to keep his mouth zipped for tomorrow, too. See how thatmade them feel, the stupid—

"Yami!" Yami felt himself being poked in the shoulder. He turned and saw Anzu pointing to the front of the room.

"Conjugate!" Frau said. Yami looked down at the handout on his desk—it had different irregular verbs listed on it, with their conjugations off to the side.

"Uhm…which one?"

"I just told the class!" Frau said, "And of course you were listening! Conjugate!"

"Which one, Anzu?" Yami asked.

"Sein," Anzu replied promptly.

"You're too nice," Frau said to Anzu, "You weren't supposed to tell him!"

Nonetheless, Yami began to recite the verb's tenses, thinking that he should probably get his mind off of the willow thing before he got _really_ angry about it. He didn't mean to be so irked—the whole subject just… irked him. Exponentially.

He was still thinking about it after school. Yami sighed, and slammed his locker door shut. He hoped they didn't take his bad temper personally. Now that he'd calmed down, he realized he had acted a bit weird… especially considering that they hadn't known him for very long; he'd been told before that he was somewhat confusing at first.

Yami made his way through Domino, trying to remember which hallway led where. There were so many that he still couldn't keep track of them all, and it had gotten to the point where he was no longer a "new kid" in the brand-new sense of the term. People knew his name, and were starting to place him where they saw fit.

Therefore, he should know how to get to the gym, after the umpteenth time of trying to find his way there…

Yami suddenly spotted a very short guy with spiked hair at the very end of the hallway he had just turned into, silhouetted against the bright sunlight filtering through the large window next to him. There was only one person that could be. Yami started to walk over.

He had already heard rumors going around about he and Yugi being related, and he had been told on many occasions that he looked very similar to Yugi—especially when they were both wearing their school uniform. Personally, Yami didn't see it. But maybe he just hadn't taken the time to look.

It was uncanny, about the hair, though… Yami thought he was being all original, when he had first decided to get his done that way. He was probably the only one at Dalton who would ever have that haircut, too. Yami smiled a little, remembering how Bakura had laughed so hard, when he had first seen it; Yami distinctly remembered him saying that it looked like he had a really ugly fan strapped to his head. Yami had shut him up soon enough, though, by creaming him at their next basketball game in the park.

It was different, being at a coed school now. He had only been at Dalton for two years and half a semester, but he had gotten so used to and comfortable with the atmosphere, that changing back to a regular school was… different. It wasn't better, or worse. It was just different.

Now that he was closer to Yugi, he could see past the sunlight and into what he was actually doing.

And it seemed like nothing. Yugi was standing at his locker, his hand on the latch as if he were about to open it. He looked very apprehensive.

"Hey," Yami said. Yugi blinked, and looked up at Yami.

"You might want to step back," he stated.

"…Why…?" Yami asked, confused.

"There's something in here," Yugi replied, nodding towards the locker.

"Okay..." Yami said, giving Yugi a strange look.

"I'm trying to figure out what it is before I open it," Yugi explained. Obviously he thought this was a sufficient explanation, because he went back to staring at the locker door. Yami wondered if Yugi had forgotten about World History that morning; he didn't seem to be in much of a hurry at all.

"I think I've got it," he said finally, more to himself than Yami, and got a firmer grip on the latch. He then saw that Yami hadn't moved.

"You want to get your shoes wet?"

"N—No…"

"Then step back."

Yami took a small step backwards. Yugi got as far as he could from the locker while still holding on to the latch. Which, for Yugi, wasn't very far at all. Yami wondered if he was actually a midget; they had handicaps for people like that…

Yugi opened the door.

"Sh—!" Yami stopped in mid-obscenity, leaping back as a floor-length locker full of water balloons came cascading out at them, bursting upon impact with the floor. So many had been stuffed in there that they flooded the width of the hallway easily, seeping into the bottoms of all the lockers within the vicinity.

"What the hell!"

"Told you your shoes would get wet," Yugi said. The locker door swung shut again, and Yugi hopped off of it with a small splash.

"How...did you do that?" Yami asked, wondering if he really had seen that right...

"Easy," Yugi replied. He jumped up, and somehow got a hold of the lowest opening near the top of the locker, strengthening the hold with his other hand as his tennis shoes simultaneously gripped its smooth front. He almost looked like a frog, pasted against the locker's face.

Yami shook his head. The midget was getting more strange by the minute. Yugi landed on the floor again with a light splash, and walked over to where Yami was still standing.

"Well," he sighed, "That's just dandy."

"What is?" Yami asked, falling into pace alongside Yugi as he started walking down the hallway in the direction Yami came.

"They know my new locker combination."

"Who, Joey and Jim?" Yami asked, taking a guess.

Yugi shrugged. "Maybe," he said. "It doesn't really matter."

Yami frowned. "...What do you mean? Don't you want to know who filled your locker with balloons?"

"Well, it's only a matter of time before the someone that actually found it out is everyone at Domino."

"…Why would everyone want to know your locker combination?" Yami asked.

It was a few paces before Yami realized there were was only one pair of shoes squishing. He turned around.

"Wha--? Oh. You stopped."

Yugi was standing perfectly still, giving Yami an incredulous look.

"You don't know why?" he asked quietly. "Seriously?"

"No…" Yami shook his head.

"You can't tell?"

"Can't tell what?" Yami asked. He really didn't know, as obvious as it seemed to be to Yugi. In fact, his reaction had Yami slightly confused. And it didn't help, what Yugi did next—

He laughed.

The sheer abruptness of it startled Yami so much that he jumped. But what startled him even more was the actual laugh that leapt out of Yugi's throat.

Yami had heard Yugi laugh before—but it had only been a dry, short kind of laugh that didn't last long; kind of like what Yami imagined his sense of humor to be. But what was coming out now was the exact opposite; it was a long, lively, musical laugh, carrying a lighthearted tone through the halls that Yami didn't think Yugi was capable of.

"W—what's so funny?" he stammered. "Someone just found out your locker combination, put water balloons in it, you don't know who it is, and you're laughing because _I_ don't have a clue?"

Yugi had controlled himself at that point, and he cleared his throat.

"Sorry," He said, "it's just… I've never had someone ask me that before. Everyone's always known."

"Well…I don't." Yami said. Yugi shook his head, and started walking again.

"It's not really that funny."

"…Then why were you laughing?" Yami asked. His asking questions every other second made him feel slow, but he couldn't figure out any other way to shed light on this bizarre character walking beside him.

"Because it was…" Yugi paused, thinking.

"What?"

"… different, I guess. I just assumed...well. Never mind." He turned down a smaller, newer-looking hallway that Yami had never seen before. But he followed Yugi down it, intrigued by his sudden end to the thought.

"You assumed what?"

"Nothing, nothing," Yugi said dismissively, pushing open a door to the outside. Suddenly, they were bathed in afternoon sunlight, and facing the track.

"Whoa…" Yami said, squinting his eyes, "So _this _is how everyone gets to gym so quickly!"

"Don't you have a map?" Yugi asked, starting across the field.

"I think… It's somewhere in my room, though. I lost it the first day."

"Ah." Yugi replied, "It's kind of hard to get to know the school without one."

"No kidding—I still have trouble remembering my way to my classes."

"Well, if you go the same route, it shouldn't be that hard."

"I do; I've been going the same ways since I came here."

"…oh."

Yami's eyes had gotten used to the light now, and he saw the willow on the other side of the field. And again, he remembered that Joey, Honda, and Jim had all been teasing him about his lack of knowledge about it.

"…Is there something dangerous about the willow?" Yami asked aloud.

"No," Yugi replied. "That's not what Joey and Jim were laughing about."

"Do you know what it was?"

"Yeah. Everyone knows."

Yami rolled his eyes.

"We've been through this. I don't _know_ what everyone knows."

Yugi shook his head. "It's kind of stupid, anyway, what they were laughing about. Completely juvenile, in my opinion."

Yami raised his eyebrow at Yugi's choice of words, but he didn't say anything. Supposedly, every second this kid wasn't in or studying for school, he was reading. He had an excuse to sound like a dictionary.

"What was it?" Yami asked.

"The One-Sided Willow is where people go when they don't want anyone to interrupt them," Yugi said.

"…That's it?"

"Well—it's a certain kind of 'not wanting to be interrupted'…"

"Like…?" Yami prompted. He still wasn't getting it.

"Okay—Usually, when people go there, they go in pairs."

"Pairs…? Wait—You mean…it's a makeout place?"

"Essentially, yes."

Yami stopped walking.

"And they thought—_Joey_!" Yami exclaimed, as he felt anger well up inside him again. Obviously they thought was hilarious, thinking of Yami and Yugi under the Willow, doing something _else_ besides studying…

"Like I said, it's completely stupid.," Yugi said, crossing his arms. He had that annoyed look he'd given Yami in World History that morning.

"Yeah," Yami said, "I don't even know you that well."

"Not to mention I'm straight." Yugi said.

"Yeah, that too…" Yami agreed. He took another look at the willow. It was crowded into the wall of green that bordered half the track, sticking out like an odd brick on the side of a building.

"If you want, we could just go to the library instead," Yugi suggested.

"No… I want to see what the One-Sided thing is about." Yami said.

Yugi shrugged. "Alright."

When they made it across the track and through the branches, Yami immediately looked up. Jutting out above his head was a massive, blackened, mutilated lump of wood where the foundations of branches should have been. There were some leaves sticking out of the black knot, but they were few and far between, and they didn't even look like willow branches.

What lay beyond the willow more than made up for its unsightliness—in fact, it seemed like a benefit. The ground sloped downwards from the willow's roots into a small sea of trees, rising and falling with the uneven land underneath it, until it gave way in the distance to the depths of the city again, stopping abruptly. The willow shut off all views and thoughts of the school behind it.

"Wow…" Yami breathed. It was if they had stepped into another world...Yami could swear he heard some kind of water trickling somewhere...

"This _is_ nice," Yugi said. Yami looked down at him.

"You've never been here before?"

Yugi shook his head. "I've never had anyone to go with."

"Ah."

They stood for a moment, taking in the scenery before them. Yami could imagine why it was a popular makeout spot. He wondered idly what it would look like at night, with the city spread out over the line of trees like that…he imagined it would look pretty nice...

"Anyway," Yugi said, a while later, "You wanted to work on the project?"

"Oh, yeah…" Yami said distantly, letting his backpack slip off his shoulder.

There were many roots of the Willow's that were raised above the ground, which made a series of comfortable seats near its trunk. Yugi had already settled himself on one of these, though he had done so very oddly; he was cross-legged on a thin branch that Yami didn't think one could balance on. Yugi seemed to be floating. Yami picked a thicker branch, and took out his notebook. He didn't feel like doing anything at related to school at all—something about the atmosphere sucked it out of him.

He felt a pair of large, purple eyes watching him.

"You didn't bring your stuff?"

Yugi shook his head. "I didn't have any homework."

"Not even math! She gave us five zillion problems _and _the review!"

"I finished," Yugi replied simply.

Yami gawked for a minute at Yugi, who just stared blankly back.

"I still don't know how you do that," Yami said finally. "I have no clue what's going on in there…"

"You have more of a clue than some people."

"Yeah, right," Yami said with a dry laugh.

"Jill doesn't have a clue."

"...Who?"

"The girl in the front row," Yugi said. "And Reese and Jennah don't really care if they have a clue or not. They're always arguing anyway—everyone knows they like each other. And Nick doesn't look too happy about it, either; he's always interrupting them. He doesn't pay much attention, either, and probably isn't doing that well. Although, I don't know about that guy in the corner… I think his name's Craig, but I'm not sure…. He just sleeps all the time. So either he's phenomenally good, or more likely really bad. He's probably doing worse than you are, too."

"...Ah."

Yugi tilted his head slightly to the side, squinting thoughtfully at Yami.

"But you, I think, will end up with either a 'b' or a 'c' in the class. I can't see you pulling off an 'a' this late in the semester, but you could pass. You just need to study."

"…And what makes you think that?" Yami asked, giving Yugi a doubtful look.

"Just a hunch," Yugi replied, with another shrug.

Somehow, Yami knew it was more that just a hunch; hunches weren't that detailed. Still, he was glad that _one_ rumor wasn't true, about Yugi…

"You must have a lot of friends," Yami said, "to know so much about people."

He looked over to see Yugi's eyes wider than Yami had seen them yet, giving Yami the impression that he was missing something very big.

"I don't have any," he said. The calm tone he used unnerved Yami visibly. Yugi just blinked.

"_Nobody_?" Yami finally asked.

"Nope."

"But then—how do you know so much?"

"I have ears," Yugi said simply, "I can hear."

"…and that's all you do?" Yami asked quietly. "You listen?"

"Yeah."

The truth _was_ as depressing as the rumors. Yami had expected a little exaggeration, on their part, but…what was flying around the rest of Domino seemed to be right.

"It's not bad, or anything," Yugi said, looking out over the forest below. But Yami could tell by his expression that he thought it was.

It really was.

They didn't get anything done in the way of schoolwork, that afternoon. After their conversation things had been quiet, and awkward. Yami finally suggested that they go to the library, but then Yugi had checked his watch, and said that he needed to go. And so they'd packed and left, parting at the sidewalk, and heading in opposite directions.

Yami was about halfway down the block Domino High was on when he realized why he'd thought of the willow as a place to meet;

He passed by the willow on his walk home from school. And even from the sidewalk, it had seemed so strange that it had stuck out in his mind.


	8. The new student?

What do you know, two chappies in the same weekend! I AM proud of myself!

And now…

Number one…

the LARCH.

THE

LARCH.

Sorry! (slaps self ) random Monty Python Moment…. Don't mind that Hedgehog behind the curtain…

**Hedgehog:** DIMMESDALE!

**Trempush: **YIPE! Here's Chapter eight, everyone! (Throws down on table and runs away)

* * *

Yugi heard angry footsteps come in the door, and cross the front of Mr. Dither's classroom. He looked up.

Yami's glare seemed to have a very annoyed glint to it today. Yugi watched silently as Yami walked down the row of desks, letting his books drop haphazardly on his own. But he didn't sit down. Yugi knew Joey was trying to keep a straight face without even turning back to look, but he turned around in his seat, anyway—he wanted to see what happened. Jim was laughing outright.

"So," Joey snickered, looking to Yugi, then up at Yami, "How'd it go?"

THAP!

Ooh.

Didn't look like Joey was expecting _that_…

"What was _that _for, man!" Joey yelped, rubbing his head where Yami had slapped it.

"You know very well what!" Yami snapped. "I hope you enjoyed whatever mental images you got from not telling me about the Willow!"

"…what does that mean?" Joey asked, suddenly looking confused.

"Yuck!" Jim said, "Yami! We weren't thinking of _that_!"

"Of what!" Joey asked.

"Maybe Jim will escort you to the Willow and show you," Yami replied coolly, arching an eyebrow.

"Wha—_Oh_." Joey's eyes widened, and he looked over at Jim. They both promptly started to gross out.

Yugi simply watched them squirm in their seats, very amused. He tried not to show it too much, though—Joey would come looking for him, if he laughed at him.

Yami, meanwhile, had sat down in his seat again, arms crossed. His face cleared as he saw Joey shiver, hitting his head to get the image out of his mind.

Yugi turned around in his seat again, and tried to fight down a laugh. He knew Yami had been angry when he had found out the secret of the One-Sided Willow yesterday, but Yugi didn't know Yami would actually act on it. The _expression_ on Joey's face, though…. Yugi set his textbook upright on his desk, and laughed as quietly as he could behind it.

The lesson started without further interruptions or interludes. Mr. Dither went on, the lizard tail waggling about as usual. It was green today; Yugi was actually watching it, for once. He knew exactly what the lesson plan was, and what points and facts Mr. Dither was going to hit upon, when he explained it. It was sad, but… the tail was more interesting.

Suddenly, there was a knock on the door.  
"Laura, go get that." Mr. Dither said distractedly. Laura did so, and sat back down.

The person standing on the other side was a very tall man, with brown hair that barely hung over his eyes and sharp, hard facial features. Everything about him was clean cut and precise almost to a surreal point—especially in a room where things were inherently messy. He walked in, his step (Yugi thought) true to his appearance; official. Mr. Dither looked up.

"Oh, Hello. If you would just sit over there I'll be with you in a moment."

The man cleared his throat, and handed Mr. Dither a piece of paper.

"I am a student here," he said. The room realized as one that he was, in fact, wearing a school uniform. It had been almost unrecognizable, it was so neatly pressed, and so naturally worn. Most people looked imprisoned inside of it. Yet this man—or rather, new student—held himself in it as it were made for him alone. Mr. Dither stared at him a moment—even the lizard tail was still.

"Oh!" He finally said, blinking, "Sorry, I thought—"

"Where do I sit?" The student interrupted shortly. Mr. Dither handed the schedule back to the student, and pointed over to the corner of the room where only one desk remained—the one behind Yami.

"Over there, it looks like. Yami can tell you what's going on."

The new student smirked suddenly, and nodded to Mr. Dither. He walked down the aisle, covering large distances with his strides, each footstep echoing loudly through the now silent room. Quietly he settled into his assigned seat, and smirked at the head in front of him. Yugi realized then that Yami was the only one in the room that wasn't staring at this new, unique entity. Instead, he was focused intently on copying what was on the board. A little too intently, Yugi thought—for Yami, anyway...

The scraping of chalk turned everyone's eyes and attention to the front again, where Mr. Dither continued to lecture. Yugi kept one ear turned towards what was going on behind him—that new kid was quite interesting, as was Yami's reaction.

Not five minutes later, Yugi barely heard a foreign voice say,

"I thought we'd meet again."

There wasn't a response.

"I didn't know you lived this far east," he continued in a conversational tone.

"I didn't," Yami replied lifelessly, "I moved."

"Ah. And where were you before?"

Yami didn't say anything.

"Heh," the new student laughed. Though Yugi could only qualify it as a laugh by its abrupt nature; it was too dry and cold, otherwise, to be considered anything close to a laugh.

"You stayed at Dalton, didn't you?"

"And what if I did?" Yami asked, in a wary tone.

"Then I was right."

"About what?" Yami asked.

The new student laughed that dry laugh again. "I could _smell_ it on you. Dalton has left its mark."

"….What about _you_, Kaiba? Or do I have to remind you that you did, in fact, mingle with the rest of us at one point in your life?"

"There's no need to—I remember quite well. But I left Dalton before it had a chance to settle in. You, on the other hand... I'm surprised no one's—"

"Say one more word and I'll strangle you," Yami replied. He sounded as if he were suppressing a strong wave of anger.

"So you haven't said anything!" Kaiba said, obviously highly amused, "This _will_ be fun…"

"Shut it!" Yami's tone was so abruptly vehement that Yugi jumped. "Just _shut it!_"

"Aren't you supposed to be helping me? I have no clue what this teacher is talking about," Kaiba replied, in a mocking tone. He was obviously enjoying himself.

"Go bug someone else's ass."

"You're probably right." Kaiba replied coolly, "Yours has gotten enough abuse as it is."

There was a sudden scraping of a desk. Yugi looked back just enough to see that Yami had twisted around to face Kaiba, and was giving him the most deadly glare Yugi had seen on Yami yet.

"Is that a _threat_, Kaiba?"

"It's whatever you want to make of it, Yami."

"Hey!" Mr. Dither said sharply. Everyone in that corner turned to the front. "If you two have a problem, you can handle it in the administrator's office. Understand?"

Yami faced the front again, crossed his arms, and kept silent. Mr. Dither's own glare lingered on him for a moment, before he turned around and started talking again.

After a while, Kaiba spoke in a quiet tone.

"You heard him. He doesn't want us to quarrel in his classroom."

"Pick a place!" Yami retorted, in just as low a voice—but that venom was still very much there.

"All right then, I will." Kaiba said. Yami snorted, and muttered something under his breath. Yugi didn't catch what. He hardly needed to though; he was sure it was something extremely inappropriate for a classroom setting.

Yugi distractedly read and reread the same sentence in the textbook, which was still open in front of him, without understanding it. That had been one of the most confusing conversations he had ever listened into—and he had done a lot of that, in his lifetime. What did Kaiba know that Yami didn't want told? And what was that about Dalton's mark? Could a school even leave a mark? What kind of place _was_ Dalton, anyway? The only thing Yugi knew about it was that Yami used to have six classes a day, and that his math class was easier than Mrs. Roberts'.

Whatever was going on, they obviously didn't like each other. That much an amoeba could discern. Although it probably wouldn't assume that one of them was going to look very different, come tomorrow. Yugi did. But personally, he thought it was going to be a draw. They both looked like they could cause some serious damage, and weren't afraid to—especially to each other. Yugi was predicting large bruise on either one or the other, maybe both.

Wait—

The new kid—Kaiba—hadn't set the place. He had just agreed that he would pick one.

So how…? Yugi shook his head. How often did that happen! Two enemies agree to duke it out somewhere, and they don't agree on a place?

… now Yugi was just _completely_ confused…

Yami was absolutely _furious_. Of all the people that could have walked through that door, it had to be _him_! HIM! Yami would have let a convicted murder from the local jail sit behind him before he would let Kaiba! The rest of the seats just HAD to be taken, didn't they! They just HAD to put a desk there, just to make Yami's life a living HELL. All sorts of curses and insults ran through Yami's head during the period, as his mind churned over the conversation they had just had…

Kaiba had some fucking nerve, to start hinting at _that_ whole issue. He really had some fucking nerve…he hadn't even waited a couple of days, to keep Yami in suspense. He was the only person their age who knew about that whole thing, beside Yami himself. Yami knew he would have brought it up sometime, but the first few seconds after _walking into first period_! _That_ was just too much!

He fumed all throughout math class, thinking of how royally Kaiba was going to get creamed—wherever he chose. Yami felt he was doing a favor, letting Kaiba pick his place of blood loss. Or broken bones. Something… anything to keep his punk-assed mouth shut.

He noticed that Yugi looked back at him a couple of times. He seemed curious and a little concerned, if Yami was seeing things right.

Yeah, well… that probably _did_ sound a bit weird, if you didn't know what was going on…

He'd just have to stay in the dark about this one, though. There was no way Kaiba was going to spill. Yami would make sure of that…

In gym, Joey and Jim told Honda everything. Which was nice for Yami—he got to see what everyone else had heard.

"Hey Honda—you know a guy named Kaiba?" Joey asked.

"No," Honda replied, setting his stuff down. "There's the company, but I don't know any_body _with that name."

"Yami does," Jim said.

"Oh, really?" Honda asked. "Is he related to the company at all?"

"Oh, yeah," Yami replied sarcastically, throwing his binder into his locker much harder than he needed to, "He's the fuckin' CEO!"

"Dude…" Honda said, eyes widening at Yami's state.

"Man, you shoulda seen them in World History," Joey said, "The guy walks in and we all thought he was a school inspecteh, or somethin'—he was all professional and stuff. But then he says he's a student, and Mr. Dithah tells him to sit down behind Yami. Two second later they're at each other's throats. Yami looked ready to kill."

"Wow," Honda said.

"Yeah," Jim said, "And it sounds like it's getting finished after school."

"Today? That's fast," Honda said.

"They knew each other before, at Yami's old school," Joey said. "What was the name of it again?"

"Dalton," Yami said, throwing his uniform into the locker, and shutting the door. "He was only there for a year."

"What happened after that?" Jim asked.

"His uncle decided to home school him."

"That's weahd," Joey said. "Why send 'im through freshman yeah if you're just gonna yank 'im out again?"

"He had his reasons." Yami said, as they all migrated out into the gym.

"What do you mean?" Honda asked. Yami shrugged.

"He just did."

"Oh."

In German, Yami had calmed down enough to focus on his work again. But not enough to escape the scrutiny of Anzu.

"Yami?" She asked, the moment he sat down. "What's wrong?"

Yami raised an eyebrow, and looked at her for a minute.

"You're good," he said. Anzu shrugged.

"It's not hard to tell."

Yami rolled his eyes. "After the entire day…" he muttered.

"It happened this morning?"

"Yeah," Yami replied. "You know someone named Kaiba?"

Anzu thought for a moment. "Is he new here?"

"Yeah—as in today."

"I think he's in my lit class. Is he really tall, brown hair, blue eyes?"

"Ego the size of China—yeah, that's him."

"Ah." Anzu replied. "Do you not like him?"

"That," Yami replied with a derisive laugh, "Is the understatement of the year."

"I see."

Anzu didn't ask any more about it, and Yami was glad. He didn't really want to talk about it, either. He spent the rest of class copying down notes—for the _third _time that day…

After basketball practice, Yami walked home, as usual. His house wasn't far at all from the school, which was nice.

What wasn't was the fact that the owners before them had hidden a few surprises for them, once they moved in. Like the fact that none of the doors opened properly; the front door had to be hit in a certain spot to joggle whatever it needed for the lock to function properly. Then, Yami would have to ram the key in at just the right angle for the lock to accept it. It was more than a little annoying, and even though Yami had run off some steam during practice, he still was mad about World History that morning.

"Aiie!"

Yami blinked, and frowned. Did Mom and Dad have someone over? That scream didn't sound like theirs… yet it sounded vaguely familiar…

"Amir! There is someone trying to break in!"

That was _definitely_ not Mom's voice. Yami just shoved the key the rest of the way into the lock, and wrenched at it until he heard it click. But before he could do anything else, the door was yanked open from the other side, sending Yami, a backpack, and a gym bag flying into the front hallway.

"YAAGH!" Yami yelled, before falling face-first onto the floor. He heard a frightened gasp from above, and older voice say,

"Oh! Help! Help! It's a young man!"

"_Mom_!"

Yami looked up to see Dad, standing in the doorway to the living room. He had his arms crossed.

"That's your grandson!"

Yami turned to see that, indeed, his father's mother was standing behind the door, staring down at Yami with a shocked expression.

"You…." But she didn't finish her sentence; her eyes were darting all up and down Yami, taking him in as if for the first time. Yami sat up.

"Hi, Gramma," He said, as cheerfully as he could manage. It wasn't very. Not that she noticed—

"Your _hair_!" She squeaked, walking as quickly as her elderly legs would carry her over to Yami's side. It was then Yami realized that she hadn't seen him for five years. She probably hadn't been outside Egypt since then, either.

"It's pointed!" Gramma said—she looked horrified.

"Is that bad?" Yami asked, knowing damn well what the answer was going to be.

"It doesn't look natural at all!"

"Well… that's kind of the point, Gramma."

"Why is the front door open?" Mom asked, walking up behind Dad.

"Oh, you're home. Did practice go well?"

"His hair is pointed!" Gramma exclaimed, turning to Mom, "How could you let him do this?"

Mom shrugged. "He's young. He can afford to look bizarre."

"But what about when he starts looking for a wife?"

"That comes later," Dad said firmly.

"Yeah, practice went well," Yami said, walking over and shutting the front door.

"How about school?" Mom asked.

"Fine," Yami said, hoping Mom didn't pry. He knew he didn't sound that convincing, but the last thing Yami needed was to have to tell Mom about Kaiba. Not when Gramma was over, anyway…

There was suddenly some muffled rambling coming from the living room. Mom and Dad stepped aside to reveal Granddad, jabbering on in Egyptian. But he stopped as his eyes fell on Yami. He then gave out a cry of joy, and Yami walked over to receive the hug his grandfather was offering him.

"Hey, Granddad," Yami said. Granddad said something in Egyptian, and Yami looked up at Dad for a translation.

After the stroke a couple of years back, Granddad hadn't been quite the grandfather Yami remembered as a child. It hadn't been a large stroke, and Granddad was perfectly functional—something that everyone had been extremely thankful for. Granddad could still walk, talk, breathe, stand upright, laugh… all those things that made him appear fine. And the first couple of times Yami saw him after he had been released from the hospital, Yami had almost believed that he was fine—as good as before.

But that only lasted until Yami opened his mouth and started to speak. Then Granddad would get that confused look on his face, and he'd turn to Gramma, asking for an explanation in Egyptian.

It was the only language Granddad knew now. He'd traveled the world, lived for years in other countries, acting as a translator for at least twenty languages… he'd been famous, in the translating field. He'd been known for his friendliness, his leadership, and his sense of humor.

Now, Yami had to look to Dad to understand two words of what he was saying.

"He says you look different," Dad said, smiling.

"Heh," Yami smiled, "So do you, Granddad."

Gramma translated. And Granddad laughed, holding Yami out in front of him to see. Yami was a little taller than him, and Granddad had to tilt his head up only slightly to see Yami in the eye.

"'I can't decide who you look more like now; father or mother'," Dad said.

"I'd say both," Yami replied. Granddad nodded, when Gramma had translated.

It was true. His skin tone was somewhere in the middle of his pale mother and his bronzed father, giving him the look of a white kid who had just gotten back from spring break at the beach. He had his father's thin, arched eyebrows, a face that was shaped uncannily like his mother's, and a height that was somewhere between the two. He laughed like his father. He yelled like his mother.

The only thing about him that didn't seem to belong to anyone were Yami's eyes—a deep, striking mahogany that flared between brown and a deep, distinguished red. They were almost as bizarre as his hair.

"Anyway, dinner's ready," Mom said. "I know it's kind of early, but I didn't think anyone would mind."

And everyone agreed that no, they didn't. They all headed into dining room, where everything was already set out.

"So," Yami said, after everyone had sat down and had started eating, "Where are you and Granddad going?"

Some random memories of Granddad's had been lost, along with the languages. And ever since then, Gramma had been taking him to places he had talked about a lot, whenever she could. They were well off, so it wasn't a problem. She just needed to schedule things properly, as there were times when Granddad was in a great mood for travel, and other times best left in Egypt. And always, no matter if they were traveling halfway across the world from Domino, or fifty miles west of it—they always stopped for a visit.

It hadn't been happening as recently, but it still did. And Yami liked the fact that Granddad was going somewhere again, now. He just seemed happy, whenever he was traveling. Gramma said he didn't remember why he liked riding in planes so much, or feeling the wind on his face in a boat, or in a car… he said that he just liked it. And Yami always wondered if it wasn't just a feeling—not really explainable by a memory at all.

"We're going to see Dr. Finn and his colleagues—they're in Thailand right now."

"Sounds nice," Mom said.

"Yes. It's been a while since we've been there. It'll be nice to see it again."

"When was the last time you guys were there?"  
Gramma chewed for a moment, thinking.

"I think it was somewhere between fifteen and seventeen years ago. I can't remember now."

"After a while, the years just kind of blur together, don't they?" Dad said. Gramma nodded.

Everyone turned to Granddad, as he said something to Yami.

"He wants to know how school is going," Gramma said. "What's it like, going back to a coed school?"

Yami shrugged. "It's different, but it's not really shocking, or anything."

"Well," Gramma said, straightening, "At least there wont' be any more confusion."

Yami looked out the window on the wall across from him.

"Right?" She asked. Yami nodded.

"Yami?" Mom asked. Crap.

"Yeah?" Yami said, looking over at Mom.

"Is something wrong?"

"No," Yami replied, a little too falsely.

"You sure?" Dad asked, looking Yami in the eye. Yami just turned to the window again.

"Did something happen at school today?" Mom asked. Yami was silent. _Crap!_

"What is it?" Dad pried. Yami sighed heavily, and braced himself. This wasn't going to be pretty…

"There's… a new kid at school." He started tentatively, "He just came today."

"Did something happen?" Mom asked. She looked genuinely worried, now. "Did you get into a fight?"  
"No," Yami said, "We didn't hit each other, anyway…"

"What? What did he say?"

Crap. Yami was about to unleash world war three, he was sure.

"He… he bugged me about Dalton."

"It was someone from Dalton?" Mom asked. "Who?"

Yami didn't say anything. Damn his stupid expressive face! Damn Mom's extremely acute mind-reading skills. Some people didn't need to be gifted with telepathy—they already can read it in a person's body. _Why _did Mom have to be one of them!

"It wasn't—no, he's home schooled now…" Mom trailed off. Yami shook his head.

"It's him."

Gramma dropped her fork.

"_What_!"

"Kaiba is now going to Domino High," Yami stated. He then got up from the table.

"I'm going to do my homework."

And he walked away, hoping that nobody dragged him back to pull the whole thing out of him. He couldn't imagine what'd happen if they knew the _whole_ conversation.

Thankfully, he got to his room without a word being spoken. He shut the door, and though again, for the umpteenth time, what had happened.

"_I could smell it on you. Dalton has left its mark."_

"_So you haven't mention anything! This_ will _be fun_…"

Yami growled under his breath, and clenched his fists at his sides, resisting the urge to punch something out. That arrogant bastard was _really_ going to get it…

The fucking _nerve_…

* * *

(A/N: Just so you know… it's supposed to be confusing. Things will be explained in due time.) 


	9. Mind Games

And as always, before we begin, I must address my dear, kind reviewers, whom have taken the time to actually read this story. I thank you all.

Now—ONWARD! (Holds up sword)

* * *

"Yami?"

It was mom.

"What?"

"You all right in there?"

Yami groaned, and got up from his desk chair to open the door.

"What do you think?" he asked irritably.

"I just asked," Mom replied, matching his frown, "Don't bite _my_ head off."

"How's Gramma?" Yami asked.

Over the past hour and a half, Yami had tried to do his homework, and had gotten what was possible to get done. Algebra remained untouched, but… some things just couldn't be solved in a decent number of years.

"She's taking it well," Mom said. Yami gave her a skeptical look, and Mom shook her head.

"You're blowing this way out of proportion. You know that, right?"

"No," Yami replied, walking back to his desk chair and sitting down, "I don't."

"Yami," Mom said heavily. She came in, and sat down on Yami's rumpled bed. "It's not just what happened at Dalton. Yes, your Grandmother's sensitive about that kind of thing, but it's more than that."

Yami was silent.

"You know what I'm talking about," Mom said gently. Yami sighed heavily, and crossed his arms. Yeah—he knew damn well what she was talking about…and that really didn't make it any better.

"It's… it's not _right_," He said. "And it's really frustrating when he just kind of… pops up out of nowhere, throwing his worst at you three minutes after he sits down to his first class."

"So he started it?"

"I wouldn't have said anything, if he hadn't!" Yami snapped.

"What did he say?" Mom pressed on, unperturbed by her son's outburst.

Yami put his hand on the back of his neck, where it found the chain of his necklace.

"Well…" he paused. He didn't really want to tell Mom, because she would tell Dad, and then Dad would find something about it to freak out about… because that's just the way Dad was; a very panicky man.

Then again, he needed someone else's thoughts on the whole thing; it had been so confusing to him, it almost wasn't Yami that had reacted—it had been Yami's anger that had yelled back at Kaiba, giving in to his insinuations and insults.

"He said that he could smell 'Dalton's mark' on me, or some shit like that," Yami said. "Then he tried to say what it was, and I shut him up before he finished. So then, he was all excited that he had something to tease me about."

"I see," Mom said. "…anything else?"

"Mr. Dither yelled at us to be quiet. So then, Kaiba said we should finish talking outside class."

Mom was silent.

"Don't tell Dad that," Yami added. Man, he'd hit the _roof_…

"You're planning on actually meeting him?"

Yami shrugged. "If he wants to…I'm not going to _kill _him, or anything!" Yami snapped again, noticing his mother's uncomfortable shift on the bed.

"It's not _that_ that I'm worried about. It's his doing something to you."

"Mom!"

"Yami—these are the Kaibas we're talking about! This isn't just a fist fight you're getting into! I don't want you to get into any of those, either, but this is a little more serious!"

"look, It's not my fault what happened—"  
"I'm not talking about Dalton anymore!" Mom snapped back. She held her son's look with her own glare for a few seconds, then continued, "I'm talking about before that. Way before."

Yami stared at the posters on the wall across from his desk.

"I didn't start _that_, either."

"Well, the person who did has been dead for a very long time. And even if it wasn't yours to begin with, it's yours now," Mom said. "So you'd better start acting like it."

Yami sighed darkly. He hated it when Mom started telling him what he _should be_ doing instead if what he _was_ doing. Probably because he didn't want to admit that she said made a lot more sense than what he had been thinking. But that was besides the point.

"And going to fight Kaiba isn't helping," Mom continued.

"All right, fine," Yami said, "It won't help. But if that's not going to, then what is?"

"That's for you to figure out." Mom said, a little more gently. "I don't have that answer for you. Like you said… Kaiba's coming to Domino is completely unexpected." She got up, and walked out of Yami's room. But before she shut the door, she leaned in and said,

"You're seventeen. I know you're supposed to be free, and independent, and all the rest of it, but… this is bigger than curfews and parties. Remember that."

Yami sat still for a moment, letting those last words echo through his mind. He knew damn well this was bigger than anything he could imagine… it was just that sometimes, he had a hard time grasping the concept.

Yami tried to take his hand away from his neck, as his arm was tired—but he found that his fingers had tangled themselves quite well in the gold chain.

"Ack!" he said, as he almost choked himself while trying to yank his hand away. "Stupid—!"

Over the seven years the necklace had been clasped around his neck, Yami had developed a habit of fiddling with the chain when he was nervous, or uncomfortable. And what was even more annoying was the talent his fingers had developed of making really nasty knots in the chain. And so, swearing and trying not to let his temper flare up again, Yami got his fingers loose, and set to work trying to get the chain straight again.

It took a while.

The next morning, Yami was very tired; he hadn't been able to get that much sleep, as his mind kept buzzing with thoughts.

"Yami!" Mom yelled up the stairs, "You're going to be late!"

Yami stumbled out of his room, fully dressed and rubbing his eyes, his backpack dangling from one arm.

"Can't I sleep in for an hour an a half?" he whined.

"No, you'll miss your first classes," Mom replied from the foot of the stairs.

"Exactly," Yami said, as he stumbled down the steps. Mom shoved a lunch at him when he reached the bottom, and held him still for a moment.

"Don't skip." She said.

"I wont! I just…really want to."

"You heard your mother," Dad warned from the living room. "We'll know if you did."

"Where's the clasp?" Mom asked.

"Next to the pyramid, under my shirt," Yami replied. "That's where it always is."

"Good," Mom said. "Make sure it stays there."

"It's not like anyone knows—"

"Just in case," Mom interrupted, guiding him towards the door. "You never _know_."

"See you after school," Yami said, walking out the door.

"No practice today?"

"No," Yami said from the sidewalk, "I'll come straight home."

"All right, Have a good day!"

"'bye."

Yami started walking up the street, frowning a little. It wasn't like Kaiba was going to grab the necklace and choke him with it, in the middle of class.

Well—he might…but that wasn't very Kaiba-like. It was too obvious.

If there was anything Yami remembered about Kaiba from the incident at Dalton, it was how people could seem one way, but really be completely different. What people dealt with when they thought they were talking to Kaiba was really just a big shell. Yami realized knowing that would have been very useful, during freshman year.

But whatever. It didn't matter—Yami was now a junior, going to a completely different high school, with a completely different set of rules, and two years' distance from his last and (what he had thought at the time) final grapple with the infamous Kaiba. It was all different, and yet exactly the same as before.

Yami took a deep breath, and turned onto the street that lead to the front of the school.

Here goes nothing.

"Get to your seats," Mrs. LeGrange wheezed, as she got up to do attendance. Yami slumped into his desk just as the bell rang. The guy on his left jumped a little, as Yami's books came crashing down onto his desk extremely loudly.

The girl in front of him had stopped trying to get his attention. Yami vaguely wondered why; he hadn't scared her off, or anything…one day, when he had been talking to Yugi, she had turned around to flirt some more, but then abruptly faced the front of the room again. And she hadn't looked back since.

Not that he was crushed, or anything… just a little curious.

"_You_ look awake," Yugi said. Yami looked over at him.

That kid looked way too sunny today, Yami decided. Yugi tended to do that—Yami didn't think he ever had felt that chipper in his life. Extremely happy, yes. But not… _chipper_.

"Yeah," Yami replied, "I'm so awake I feel dead."

Yugi laughed his usual dry, short laugh. Yami didn't think he'd hear the other one until they were ten miles from school, and he was telling the funniest joke in the world to him. Something along those lines, anyway…

Yami noticed that Yugi was reading that guide again.

"How far are you?"

"Huh?" Yugi asked, looking up.

"Dad has that same guide. I was flipping through it yesterday."

"Oh," Yugi replied, seeming surprised. "That's right—you actually know about Duel Monsters. I'm on chapter seven, now."

"Ah," Yami said. "There are some funny pictures in that chapter."

Yugi raised his eyebrows.

"You didn't look at the words?"

"Nope."

Yugi laughed again.

"You're weird."

"Look who's talking."

"Heh," Yugi replied, propping his book up again.

Nothing more was said after that, as Yugi began to read again, and Yami occupied himself with the fine art of staring out into space.

Kaiba was suspiciously silent, when Yami came in to World History. He made it to his desk without a single comment from that arrogant throat of his.

He sat down, and pulled his notebook out. Yugi turned slightly in his seat so that he was facing the front corner of the room, instead of the exact front. He wanted to hear what was going on—Yami was sure of it.

Meanwhile, Joey and Jim were not as talkative as they usually were. Some jokes flew back and forth, but they had no life behind them. Yami was pretty sure why that was, too.

Class started. Everything in that back corner of the room was silent, as they all took notes, and Yugi actually answered some questions Mr. Dither asked the class. Yami looked up at the clock, after a while.

Half the class period was gone.

And Kaiba hadn't said a peep. He wasn't even doing anything annoying. He was just…

sitting there.

Yami was apprehensive; Kaiba didn't do anything without reasons. He obviously had some kind of plan hatching in his mind… but what?

Yami leaned back in his chair, as he tuned out Mr. Dither's talking. He racked his brains for a possible plan that Kaiba was concocting…but nothing came. And the shorter the remaining time in that period got, the more irked Yami became. He tried not to show it—he didn't want to give Kaiba that luxury—but he had to grudgingly admit, after a while, that Kaiba had left him a very big blank.

Well!

That was just _great_.

Day One—Kaiba brings Yami so close to losing it in the middle of class, he could practically feel himself straining under the pressure.

Day Two—Kaiba drives Yami nuts as he tries to figure out what Kaiba is plotting.

This couldn't go on.

Something had to be done.

And Yami tried, when the bell had rung. He gathered all his things together a little haphazardly, and ran after Kaiba, who was walking briskly down a hallway Yami didn't recognize.

"Hey!" Yami shouted, once he was within earshot. Kaiba didn't respond.

Yami caught up with him and grabbed his upper arm, effectively bringing him to a halt.

"I'm talking to you!" he spat.

Kaiba looked down calmly at Yami—as if he were a pest that needed to be extricated.

"I couldn't tell." He replied coolly.

"Very funny. So you're suddenly deaf, too?"

"I", Kaiba said, yanking his arm out of Yami's grasp, "Was following the rules."

"What—?"

"Mr. Dither didn't want us to disrupt his class," Kaiba interrupted, a snide tone leaking into his voice. "So I didn't."

"…You're not getting away that easily."

Kaiba raised an eyebrow. "If I were running, I would answer that. Spare me the tantrum," he added, as Yami opened his mouth to retort.

"If you're going to get this worked up about it, I'll save you a trip to the hospital."

"Not before I find out why you're trying to piss me off!" Yami shot back.

"The hallway were just in is a good place to start."

Yami looked back down the hallway he had just come from—he could see Mr. Dither's classroom door from where he stood.

"What the fuck is back there!" Yami exclaimed.

"I will be," Kaiba said. He started walking again. "After school. I won't offer again."

Yami glared at his retreating back for a moment, then turned on his heel and headed the opposite direction.

"Is it normal for you to look that pissed?" Honda asked, as soon as Yami came into the locker room.

"Kaiba didn't even say anything today!" Joey said, catching a glimpse of Yami's expression.

"Exactly," Yami replied, wrenching his locker open, "He was messing with my head."

"You're paranoid." Honda said.

"If it were anybody else, I would be," Yami said. He yanked off his shirt.

"…Why is Kaiba special?" Jim asked.

"Because Kaiba is the smartest person I know," Yami replied. "His idea of fun is to try and confuse the hell out of someone by just talking to them. And the better he knows a person, the more he tries to manipulate them to do whatever he wants."

"…that's really creepy." Honda said.

"How 'bout kinda sick?" Joey suggested.

"Whatever it is, he's doing it to me," Yami said, yanking his shoelaces much harder than he needed to.

"And that's what pissing you off?" Jim asked.

"Pretty much," Yami said. Although there was much more to it than that. But Yami just left it hanging there. Jim, Joey, and Honda didn't need to know any more. They'd probably be in there for the next two days, if he told them _everything_. They probably wouldn't like him all that much afterwards, either.

They played some soccer that day—Honda and Joey decided to pair up on the same team and beat the pants off of Yami and Jim's team.

"You wusses!" Joey kept yelling across the field. Yami and Jim would yell things right back, then trip over or fumble the ball when it was passed to them. Yami turned out to make some spectacularly clumsy moves that outdid even the freshmen, and by the end of the period, Coach had learned to stand over by their section of the field to witness the most interesting games. And even though Yami was the center of all the jokes that day, he felt much better after beating that little black and white ball as best he could. There was much to be said about sports being a stress-reliever.

Although he couldn't help but suppress a yawn, when stumbling up the stairs to Frau's room. He was somehow relaxed after the soccer, and his lack of sleep didn't make it any better. He rubbed his eyes to instill some kind of life back into them—he didn't want to fall asleep in the middle of class…

But when he opened them, he wasn't seeing glimpses of rows of desks, and Frau settling down on her stool in the front of the room.

He was staring straight into Josh Groban's face.

"YEE!" he yelled, jumping backwards. His backpack threw him even more off-balance, and he fell clumsily to the floor on top of it.

"Ow!"

Josh Groban receded, and Frau's face peered around the framed poster.

"Yami? Are you all right?"

"He startled me, Frau!" Yami exclaimed, pointing a dramatic finger at the singer. Frau took a look at the poster, then at Yami again, and started to laugh very hard. Yami just rolled his eyes, and walked up to the poster again. He realized that it was hung on the closet door, and Frau had been getting some plastic food out of it to instill some vocab into everyone that day.

When he got in, he could see Anzu hiding her snickering behind her hand.

"Like it hasn't happened to you," Yami said, sitting down.

"No, it hasn't." Anzu replied as evenly as she could.

"Whatever," Yami said, "we know your secrets."

"Josh Groban knows!" Frau said, before laughing again.

"That was my first day of school here!" Anzu said, "That doesn't count."

"Ha." Yami said. Anzu imitated him—it was a very amusing attempt.

For the rest of German, he was almost in a happy mood.

But after school, the meeting with Kaiba suddenly hit him again, and all the good feelings he had built up in German were flushed down the drain again, leaving only the icky stuff behind that Yami didn't want to deal with.

After going to his locker, Yami walked past the history hallway—it was on his way out of the school building that day, anyway. He didn't have to try and get lost anywhere.

Kaiba was there, leaning against the wall, arms crossed.

So he had been serious.

Yami paused for a moment at the corner of the adjacent hallway where he couldn't be seen, and took a closer look at the slimeball.

He was just how Yami had remembered him from Dalton, save for a few details. He'd gotten taller over the past two years, and he looked more like a man in his twenties than a junior in high school. People were mistaking him for a senior his freshman year, so it only made sense. But he still had that same haircut, and his face was exactly the same. Maybe it had gotten a little meaner, but that could have been from Yami's not seeing it at all for such a long time.

It would have been great if he had never seen him again. But even at Dalton, on that last day when Kaiba walked down the front hallway and out the front doors for the last time, Yami somehow knew he would be seeing him again. It had been one of those gut-level feelings… one of the few he had ever gotten in his lifetime.

In fact, the only other time he had felt that way was when he first saw the necklace that now hung around his neck, dangling between his father's fingers as he held it out for Yami to see.

Yami stepped out from his hiding place, and started making his way towards Kaiba. A part of him wanted to just turn around and forget it all together—after all, Mom wasn't overreacting when she said that Kaiba was dangerous.

But there was another part of him that was willing him over, yearning to know the why's of so many things. Kaiba wasn't even supposed to be here. He was supposed to be confined to the rich, snobbish life he had grown up in, receiving some kind of home-schooled education that probably made every class at Domino seem like a joke. Yet here he was, turning his head towards Yami's footsteps, setting that intimidating glare directly into Yami's eyes.

Not that Yami let it go any further. Kaiba would have to work a little harder than that, to scare him.

"You came." He said.

"I've got questions." Yami replied.

"Like why I even offered?"

"No," Yami said, stopping in the middle of the hallway, and a good distance from where Kaiba leaned. "That's yours."

"Heh," Kaiba laughed hollowly. "Then what do _you_ have in mind?"

"Your sudden interest in the lower classes."

"Hardly an interest," Kaiba stated. "Why I'm here, however, is none of your business."

"Is anything?"

Kaiba paused for the briefest second. He hadn't been expecting that.

"Did your Uncle get sick of you?" Yami pressed on. Kaiba's face fell blank, and he stared at the row of lockers in front of him.

"I chose to come," he said hollowly.

"I see," Yami said. "Better than home?"

"Not necessarily."

"But it was enough to drive you out," Yami said, piecing together a theory. That was another thing about Kaiba; he only gave you half the answers. You had to come up with the other half and make something of it.

"I am not a livestock animal. I do not get 'driven' from places."

Yami took that as a yes.

"Why Domino?" Yami asked. If Kaiba wanted to change the subject, Yami may as well, too.

"It was closest."

"No, it's not." Yami knew for a fact that Kaiba's mansion was only a few blocks from Dalton.

Kaiba's icy eyes flickered towards Yami.

"The closest in my uncle's eyes."

Yami was silent for a moment. That could only mean one thing…

"He still thinks I go there."

Kaiba nodded slowly.

"Well," Yami said, "You'll probably be leaving here soon, then."

"My uncle doesn't even know what this school looks like," Kaiba said, "Much less who's in it."

"…Ah," Yami said. So Kaiba didn't tell his uncle much. Things _had_ changed…

"Anything else, faggot?" Kaiba asked scathingly.

Yami's eyes narrowed, and his hands immediately clenched to fists.

"Say that again," he dared, his voice much more quiet—and a lot more deadly.

"What, so someone besides you can hear it?" Kaiba replied, standing up. "Your kind are more messed up than I thought."

And he walked away.

So badly, Yami wanted to run after him and beat him into a bloody pulp. His rage was suddenly boiling within him, as he remembered just why he didn't like Kaiba.

Because he meant so much more than just what he said. He always did. And if he wasn't such an asshole, Yami would admire him for it. Instead… he had to deal with this. And as much as he wanted to, Yami knew he would trigger a much bigger reaction out of Kaiba than what he was feeling right now, if he threw so much as a punch at him.

And so, Yami merely watched as Kaiba walked calmly down the hallway and around the corner. After he was gone, Yami closed his eyes, and took deep breaths to calm himself down. If he was going to stand a chance at getting more out of Kaiba (because there was so much more to know), he was going to have to control himself a lot more than he had been.

Yami turned around, and started walking in the opposite direction. He took minute consolation in the fact that Kaiba had called him what he had in a deserted hallway, instead of over twenty people's heads.

But that didn't mean he wouldn't in the future.

* * *

(A/N: yes, there's a reason for Yami's being so uptight about anyone knowing that he's gay. And it's more than just what people would think; he doesn't really care about that (I mean, come on—look at his hair!).

And I say again; this will be explained. I kind of throw you guys into the middle of a pretty intense rivalry, but reasons will be revealed. I just have to write them down.

Until then—Tschus!)


	10. A Day at Central

Chapter 10.

* * *

It was a sunny morning, on a Saturday. The air outside was clear and crisp, and the wind had just enough of a bit in it to warrant an unzipped jacket—but not a walk outside without one.

Yugi climbed the steps of the Central Library, loose backpack over his shoulder. He had taken out everything that didn't have to do with World history or the fines he had to pay, and it still looked somewhat large on him. But Yugi had given up on altering the illusion that he and the backpack were about the same size a long time ago—around the same time he had given up trying to will himself to be taller. In his junior year of high school, it was pretty evident that he was going to be staying short for a long while.

Unless someone put him on one of those racks, like the Romans used. But that was unlikely. Yes, everyone hated him, but nobody Yugi knew had any kind of torture instruments, so he was safe. He would know if they ever got one, too. Like he told Yami, under the One-Sided Willow; he could hear things. He could pinpoint who pulled the last prank on him within days after it had been carried out, if not hours. The culprit always bragged to someone about it—one of those ego things. He would definitely be able to pick up a strange bit of information like a Roman rack.

Yugi wondered sometimes if he would be a good secret agent, or something. He was always tuning in to every little detail of his surroundings, when everyone else thought he was just reading. It was just something he did naturally, almost. He had perfected his art, yes, but he had always had a knack for it. It was interesting to think about, too—creeping through top secret hideouts, spying on criminals…cracking codes…

Then again, the image of Yugi trying to combat Mr. Drug Dealer's house-sized body guard Tiny wasn't that inspirational.

…But that's what partners were for, right?

Yugi sighed, and pushed open the doors to Central. Quite frankly, he didn't think he'd have the guts to do something that dangerous.

Watch—he'd end up at some absolutely boring desk job in the middle of Domino that he hated, pushing papers from nine to five. Then he'd retire a sour old man, losing inches to osteoporosis.

… that sounded more like it.

Yugi sat down in the reading room, letting his backpack fall to the carpeted floor with a thud. It wasn't that he didn't have any ambitions… it's just that they weren't very realistic. Secret agent was about as likely as his list of ideal career choices got.

The reading room of Central was very spacious, with a high ceiling and plenty of windows and skylights to let in the autumn sun. Comfy chairs were tucked into convenient places all around the edge, and tables were scattered in the center.

Yugi loved this library. Maybe it was something in the atmosphere, and how it always seemed so comfortable, and peaceful. Or maybe it was because Yugi had been checking books out from here since he could walk.

He and Grandpa used to come up here all the time, back when Yugi was too young to come here on his own… Grandpa was the one who had gotten him hooked on reading in the first place. Yugi remembered seeing him as a little kid, surrounded by papers and books. He found out when he was older that it all had to do with the game shop he kept up, but at the time, he had thought Grandpa was just reading for fun. So he started doing it, too.

And so, the geek was born.

Strange, how things worked like that.

It wasn't long before Yugi saw Yami, wandering around the shelves, looking lost. Yugi shook his head. For all the menacing aura he could effectively give off, Yami could seem pretty helpless at times. It was very amusing to watch. But, for the sake of time, Yugi decided to take pity on him, and got up from the table. He walked over to where he had seen Yami last, and found him going down one of the rows of shelves.

"Oh!" Yami said, when he spotted Yugi. "There you are!"

"I was sitting in plain sight, you know," Yugi replied.

"You were?"

Yugi nodded slowly, feeling annoyance flare up again.

It was a serious pet peeve of his, people not seeing him—he didn't know why. It certainly didn't help, considering that it happened all the time. People would walk right past him, scanning the crowd above his head, before realizing that he had been standing right next to where they started.

Luckily, nothing showed through to his facial expression. Nothing that Yami noticed, anyway.

"…oh."

"Anyway, there's tables over here, if you want to sit down."

"Yeah, that'd be good…"

And so, Yugi led Yami over to where he had left his things, and they started to plan out what they were going to do. When they had gotten some resources and had started taking notes, Yami started fiddling with something under his collar. Yugi watched out of the corner of his eye, as his scanning to clarify some dates wasn't all that interesting. He found history itself to be fascinating—but he hated memorizing. He could do it immaculately, but it still didn't make it any more fun.

Yami's fingers finally pulled out into the open a thin gold chain, which sparkled in the sunlight from above quite brilliantly. As Yugi watched, Yami pulled more and more of the chain out, and his fingers got more and more tangled in it. They seemed to be working on their own—Yami was still copying from his book, flipping pages with his writing hand. Yugi stopped searching, and his pen stopped scribbling. How Yami's fingers could entangle themselves to well without Yami noticing was… amazing.

It didn't last, though—soon, the chain was all in Yami's hand, and only enough was left around his neck to cut into it gently. Mere milliseconds after that happened, Yami jumped, and slammed his pen down.

"Stupid—!" he hissed. Yugi blinked, and watched the spectacle quietly. He didn't quite know what to make of it.

Yami unraveled half of it from his fingers just by pulling his hand away from his shoulder. In the process, Yugi noticed something else now bulging quite noticeably, right under Yami's collar. Another tug from Yami, and it fell out and slid along the chain until it hit Yami's outstretched hand. It was a little pyramid, with an eye and a door carved into one side. The other three sides were blank, save for lines to Illustrate the outlines of blocks.

"Sorry," Yami said, noticing Yugi's stare. Yugi blinked, and looked at Yami.

"…Do you wear that all the time?"

"Yeah," Yami replied, finally getting his hands free. He started to work on the knots his fingers had created. "Dad gave it to me."

"Ah." Yugi said lightly. He looked at the pyramid again. It seemed to be made of that same material the chain was.

"That's cool."

"Thanks," Yami replied, finally getting the rest of the knots out, "it's really annoying, though—every time I'm focusing on something else, my hand starts fiddling with it."

"You don't notice?"

"…Most of the time, no."

Yugi blinked. "Odd."

"Yeah," Yami agreed, arranging the necklace back under his shirt, "really odd."

Yugi thought it was odd, too, that he wore it under his clothes. And when he asked Yami about that, he didn't quite give Yugi an answer. Yugi didn't push it any further than that. He just went back to his work, and filed it in the 'things to ask Yami later' section of his mind.

And recently, that had become quite large. He wouldn't have thought that Yami would change the subject away from him so many times, but he did. And it was only on certain topics, too—like details about his necklace. He didn't like to get into too much detail about it, no matter how often people tried to pry. He seemed to be very good at evading their questions about it, which told Yugi he must have been doing this for a very long time.

Another one was Kaiba. Yugi was still trying to figure out why, if they hated each other, they had not broken out into a fight yet. Any other two teenage boys would have thrown punches at each other ages ago—and they'd still be doing it now, if they hadn't hit each other enough to strike up the desire to resolve. But they hadn't laid a finger on the other. They hadn't even spoken to each other, since those first two days.

And Yami had gotten asked about it so often. Yet every time, he just changed the subject, or answered the inquiries so vaguely that it was impossible to get any kind of decent, informative answer out of him. All that Yugi knew—and it was only from his listening in to Yami tell other people—was that he went with Yami to Dalton for their freshman year, they were enemies, and that Kaiba went somewhere else after that. Now, he was back from that other place, and in Domino—and the whole show had been brought over here.

And there was something that Kaiba knew about Yami that Yami didn't want revealed. Yugi still remembered that first day as clearly as though it had happened yesterday.

Since then, though, Kaiba hadn't done much. He remained silent in class, doing his work with an unhappy look on his face. Yugi figured it was the natural way his face fell; he just looked mean most of the time More so than Yami did, when he was concentrating.

Yugi shook his head, and started flipping through his textbook again. He felt extremely lame sometimes—how else would he explain his fascination with watching other people's expressions and interactions? Maybe people were right; he really didn't have a life.

"You all right?"

Yugi jumped, and saw that Yami was giving him an odd look.

"Huh?"

"You look really depressed, all the sudden."

"…oh." Yugi said, staring at his book. He hadn't realized, but he had started staring off into space, lost within his thoughts. He did that sometimes… what really caught him off-guard, though, was that Yami asked him about it.

"It's nothing." He said. He really didn't feel like explaining it, anyway… he'd just sound whiny and pathetic anyway.

"You sure?" Yami asked.

Yugi nodded, and copied down another date they would need for the essay portion of the project. Thankfully, Yami left it at that.

They stayed there for a long time, collaborating at some points on what they would need to do together, other times just reading. It was hard to believe that two hours had gone by—Yugi could have sworn it was more.

But that was another thing about Central Library; you never really knew what time it was. Yugi had spent the entire day in there, when he was younger, and he refused to bring a watch. He knew that if he did, he would look at all the time. It was better to just lose track of the time for a while, then resurface in reality when you were ready to by asking someone else what time it was. Sometimes it was more than you expected, and sometimes it was less.

It was nearing two o'clock, when Yugi noticed someone walk into the main doors of the library. They were straight down the hall from the reading room, so Yugi got a very good view of them, and the people that drabbled in and out. He had been doing that periodically the entire time he had been sitting there, just staring at what people were wearing, making some guesses as to what they were returning, or looking for…

This person, though, was someone Yugi knew very well. He was short—about Yugi's height—and had white hair that suck out at odd angles. He had large, violet eyes, and a kind face. He walked straight into the reading room, and over to Yugi's table, smiling.

"Hey Grandpa," Yugi said.

"Still working on that project?" Grandpa asked, stopping next to Yami's seat. Yami wasn't there at the moment—he had gone searching for something at the edge of the reading room a while ago.

"Yeah—what's wrong?"

Grandpa shook his head, laughing.

"Just because I'm here early doesn't mean something's wrong."

"You never come early unless there is," Yugi pointed out, "the last time you came in to get me was when Mom called."

Grandpa's light expression faded, and he sat down in Yami's seat. His eyes glanced over the open books and loose papers.

"Is this yours?"

Yugi shook his head. "It's Yami's—he's my partner for the World History project."

"Oh. I guess you'll want to stay a little longer, then?"

Yugi shrugged, "Depends on what happened."

Grandpa sighed heavily.

"..it's about Mom, isn't it?" Yugi asked.

"Yes," Grandpa said hesitantly, "but it wasn't her personally."

"One of her friends?" Yugi asked flatly.

"No…her fiancée."

Yugi's mind seemed to gum up; he couldn't move for a few moments. Grandpa simply stared off into the distance.

"of all the—" Yugi started to say, but he stopped himself, and instead said, "I'll be home in about half an hour."

"All right," Grandpa said distantly, getting up again. "If you're late, I'll come looking for you."

Yugi gave Grandpa as much of a smile as he could, at the moment.

"Don't worry."

Grandpa nodded, and walked out again.

As if on cue, the moment Grandpa left the reading room, Yami came back to the table. He didn't sit down, though. Rather, he started packing things up.

"What are you doing?" Yugi asked.

"Wha—? Oh," Yami said, "I just realized—I was supposed to be home half an hour ago."

Yugi felt his eyes narrow. He sensed something very fishy… especially since—

"It's not even two. You said you didn't need to be home until six."

Yami paused, clutching a messy handful of notes.

"…oh," he replied distantly, sitting down. "….so it is."

He was much more fidgety than when he had left. And he didn't work—he just stared at what was in front of him. Yugi had never seen him act like that before…

"What did you hear?" he asked.

"What?" Yami asked blankly, jumping a little.

"When Grandpa and I were talking. What did you hear?"

"How do you know I heard—"

"Because you're the worst liar in the world," Yugi interrupted. Yami seemed to try to think of a comeback, but it never came. After a moment, his expression fell.

"All right—but I didn't hear much."

"Well…what _did_ you hear?"

"Something… about your Mom calling, and your Grandpa wanted you to come home…" Yami shrugged again, "Something like that."

Yugi stared at him, searching him for clues. They were easy to find—practically falling out of his ears. He had never seen someone so… open like that. It was as if he wasn't aware of his body language at all.

"You heard it all, didn't you?"

Yami paused for a moment. Then he dropped the pen he had been holding back onto the table.

"I didn't mean to—I was over there, and…I don't know… I heard. You can hear everything from over there." He jabbed a thumb to one of the shelves lining the reading room.

Yugi sighed darkly, and looked away. _Well_. That was just dandy.

Yami had heard.

The one thing Yugi wished would just disappear so he wouldn't have to deal with it, and his partner for a World History project had overheard Grandpa talking to him about it. How was he going to explain this?

The awkward silence grew, and neither of them moved. It wasn't something that could be explainable to someone without some kind of background information about it… things in Yugi's past…it sucked. Yugi knew it sucked. And he'd rather be aware and dealing with its suckiness by himself than have someone else feeling sorry for him. Especially when that person obviously couldn't relate.

But… there was nothing he could do about it now. It was either he left Yami with that, or he told him the whole truth so he wouldn't make up some weird story. If there was anything Yugi hated, it was the fact that people made up their own assumptions to stories they had heard only half of. They always got it wrong, anyway. This was something that he didn't want other people making up stuff about. He could deal with it when it was someone else other than him, but… this was family. As far as he was concerned, family was off-limits, as far as school rumors went.

"Come on," he said, standing up, "I'll tell you on the way home."

"T—tell me what?" Yami asked, snapping out of his reverie and following him back to the history section of the library, hastily grabbing some resources before he left the table.

"What do you think?" Yugi replied sarcastically.

"…If you don't want to—"

"If you heard half of it, you may as well hear all of it," Yugi said firmly—thankfully, no one was lounging around in the history section. "When you let something slip, at least it'll be right."

"What do you mean, 'let something slip'?" Yami asked, a tone of anger leaking into his voice.

He probably hurt Yami's sense of pride, for insulting him like that. Yugi didn't care—he was just voicing the inevitable. Nobody could keep a secret forever…

"I'm not going to go tell anyone!"

"Oh, really?" Yugi asked quietly, whirling around to face him—after all, they were still in a library. Not that Yugi ever rose his voice when he was outside the library, either… but that was a completely different story.

"Even though everyone would love for something else to make fun of me about? Let's face it—you'd be a lot more popular afterwards."

Yami's eyes narrowed to a glare, and he crossed his arms.

"You have _no_ idea who you're talking to."

Yugi slid a history book back onto the shelf.

"Enlighten me."

Yami's glare became more distinct, and focused upon its target. Yugi wasn't perturbed—he was used to that kind of thing.

"First of all, I would never spit out something like that. I've got plenty of other ways of making people suffer without dragging family into it. As far as I'm concerned, that's off-limits."

Yugi raised his eyebrows a little, and shoved another book onto the shelf. So they agreed on something.

"Secondly—I don't even want to know about your mother calling, if you're this pissy about it. We can leave it at what I heard. And if you haven't noticed, I don't really care about what other people think. I'm not going to throw away a friendship for people I don't know."

Yugi paused.

Huh. He called their talking a friendship. _That _was different…

He could feel Yami's eyes on him. He tried to start acting like he had just milliseconds before, but the movements were lame. Even Yami could see right through it, Yugi could tell.

"You're not very trusting, are you?"

_That_, Yugi thought, _was the lamest question of the century_. OF COURSE, YOU AIRHEAD!!!

Yugi thought it was bad when Yami couldn't figure out why people would be happy to have his locker number. But _this_! He thought this came in the same package with the whole 'nobody likes me' thing!

"Not really," was all he said.

A silence.

"Anyway," Yugi started again, putting the last book away, "I guess… I'll make an exception."

_Why_ he up and decided to tell Yami about Mom anyway, even after he said he didn't want to hear it, was beyond him.

They got all their things together, and Yugi paid his overdue fines. They were walking down the library steps, when Yugi took a breath, and started talking.

"Mom doesn't live with us," he said, "She just kind of left one day, when I was in fifth grade. Tacked a little note on the door, saying that she'd call when she found a place to stay. That place turned out to be Mexico, somewhere. I don't even know where. She'll call from time to time, for a few minutes. It's usually when she's drunk, and she thinks that she still lives here. It gets really annoying, after a while—especially when she gives the number to friends. Looks like she's given it to a fiancée, too. Whether that's on purpose or not, I don't know."

A silence followed. Somehow, he thought Yami wouldn't have a response for that.

They were on the corner of the block now, and they crossed the street in a silence. At the other side, Yugi stopped at the bus stop. Yami just followed. He was thinking it over, obviously. Or something like that—he had the same expression for a lot of different feelings, which Yugi found odd. Then again, Yami in general was odd.

"Has your Mom done this before? Get engaged?"

Yugi distractedly looked down the street for the bus.

"No," he said. "I suppose that's why Grandpa wanted me to come home. He probably wants to talk to me about it, or something…I don't know."

"What about your Dad?"

"If there's no such thing as an afterlife," Yugi sighed, "Then he doesn't have a clue. He died when I was three."

"And your grandfather is his father?"

Yugi nodded, still looking down the street.

"…oh."

There was a silence, as the busy city street bustled by in front of them.

"Well," Yugi said after a while, "At least we got some work done."

"Yeah," Yami replied lifelessly. "Lots of notes."

The conversation died there.

Usually, absence of conversation was a good thing, for Yugi—it meant that no one was thinking of saying mean things to him, or plotting another attack on his locker…or him.

That hadn't happened in a while, actually. Not this semester, anyway. Yugi was grateful for that. He knew that people were still capable of beating him up, if they ever felt like it, but they hadn't been.

Maybe Yugi had become unimportant enough not to bother with, anymore. It seemed like a victory, in a way. A rather morbid one, but nonetheless… it cause him less paranoia and injuries.

Yugi thought back to what he had fist predicted, about Yami. How he was going to join forces with them, sooner or later. He was impressed that Yami wouldn't go and spill his aggravation to everyone in the universe. But that didn't mean he would stand up for him, either. It confused Yugi, really.

The question sort of popped up there—he hadn't meant to say it aloud. It had been more of a wondering thing, to stay inside his own mind. But instead, it fell out of his mouth of its own accord—muttered, but nonetheless heard by Yami.

"Whose side are you on, anyway?"

"…What?" Yami asked. He looked completely confused. And Yugi's expression of surprise didn't seem to help.

"Did you ask me whose side I'm on?" Yami asked. Yugi was silent.

Yami stared at him strangely for a moment. He probably didn't even know what Yugi meant. It was amusing, to watch people when they were trying to answer a question they didn't understand.

"Mine."

Yugi raised an eyebrow. Okay… not the answer he had been expecting. Forget realizing what he had meant.

"Yours?" Yugi managed to ask.

"Yeah," Yami said.

Yugi shook his head, and looked down the street for the bus—_again_. "You're nuts."

"And?"

And what? Obviously not what Yugi had predicted.

They stood in silence again, and this time the bus cam around the corner. The only other words Yami spoke were "'Bye," when Yugi got on.

And the only thing that Yugi could think about as he bumped along the roads was a very big, revolutionary realization for him;

Maybe he should revise his assumptions, a little.

* * *

A/N: I forgot review responses! That'd kind of sad, considering only four people reviewed this chapter. I'm very happy and thankful that they did, but… I almost forgot them. Four whole people! Four is not a number one should forget! I can understand five million, or something… but not four!

Gah.

/author note

/chapter 10


	11. Zap!

All right guys… before I begin chapter 11, I would just like to say to everyone who's reading this and commenting on it that I really appreciate and love the reviews; it's like a set of buildups every time I check my mail. They bring me joy. _(collects warm fuzzies together to show as proof)._ See?

And now…

Number one.

The LARCH.

_(meanwhile, in Middle Earth…)_

Wayne: "If this olephant goes faster than five miles an hour, it'll explode!"

The Dark Lord: "Holy crap!"

_(…back at the studio…)_

The LAAAAAARRRCH.

And now…

Number one.

The LAR—OW! _(announcer falls over. Kiki, hiding dead chicken behind back, smiles at camera.)_

Trem: _(clears throat)_ ANYway…

Chapter 11

* * *

Yami watched the bus turn the corner and out of sight.

_That_ had been an interesting study session, to say the least. He never would have known half the stuff he had found out today, if Mr. Dither had decided to have them study independently. And he wasn't even talking about the textbooks.

Yami turned, and started walking down the street in the direction he thought he had gone that morning, somehow doubting that he was right. He ignored the feeling—it always came to him, anyway, even if he was going the right way.

He had been right, about his first impression of Yugi; there was certainly more to him than what met the eye. Yami hadn't been expecting something like a drunk remarried mother in Mexico, but then again… he hadn't really been expecting anything. He had just overheard Yugi and his Grandpa talking.

He hadn't even meant to. He had just been looking for another book, and the history section just happened to spill over into the shelves on the very edge of the reading room, before they switched to fiction. Yugi and his Grandpa had been halfway across the room…Yet Yami had heard every sound.

He knew that he shouldn't have heard. And he knew that Yugi shouldn't have found out that he had heard. But whenever Yami tried to hide something that he shouldn't know, he failed miserably. Couple that with Yugi's uncanny ability to catch on to thoughts (a talent that creeped Yami out _just_ a little), and you had a very flustered Yami.

Of course, the thing really unexpected was how Yugi had handled it, once he had read Yami's mind. He hadn't even thought about asking Yami to keep it a secret. He had just assumed the worst.

Yami had known Yugi was cynical, and untrusting… but he had no idea it was that bad. Yami supposed he had been a little unobservant, as far as that went; now that he thought about it, it was pretty obvious, if he had just stepped back and looked at the clues. But he hadn't, and he had been left asking for a confirmation of the obvious.

Although no amount of observation would have helped Yami with that last question of Yugi's;

"_Whose side are you on, anyway?"_

…_That_ had been completely out of the blue. Yami had tried to answer it as best he could, even though Yugi didn't really look like he wanted the question to be answered. He didn't look like he had meant for Yami to hear that, in the first place. But Yami had spit out an answer, anyway.

Maybe it was because he had heard the question before. Way back in middle school, a lonely kid with naturally white hair had asked him that….and Yami had given him the same answer. He had gotten somewhat of the same response, too, come to think of it.

Yami smiled, at the memory. It was amazing how he and that kid had changed, since then. Bakura was probably the more extroverted of them both, now—it was as if they had switched; Yami wasn't as reckless as he used to be, and Bakura seemed to get worse every year. Not to mention their looks…between Yami's hair and Bakura's clothes, they were hardly recognizable when compared to their seventh-grade selves.

Ah, well. It didn't really matter; as long as they kept in contact with each other, and talked from time to time, Yami wasn't perturbed at all.

And that was about the only thing in his life right now that didn't bug him. For one thing, Gramma had been aggravating ever since Yami had told everyone Kaiba was back at school. He had a pretty good idea of why they were still there, too—to keep an eye on him.

Yami's fists clenched at the thought. Usually, Gramma and Granddad stayed for a couple days before going off to wherever they were traveling. So far, they had stayed two weeks. Mom and Dad weren't saying anything, but Yami knew it had to do with him. He just _knew_ it. Every time he walked into that house, he could just feel their eyes on him. He didn't even come down to dinner, anymore—it was too stressful. It was as if they were all just assuming that he was going to tell them every single detail he could about Kaiba.

The problem was, there wasn't anything to report. Not that Yami would have spilled everything if something _did_ happen, but ever since their argument after school, Kaiba hadn't uttered a word in his direction. It was as if Yami wasn't even there. Yami was sure he wasn't the only one confused by this—Jim and Joey had asked him about Kaiba once. Yugi had asked him several times, and even Anzu had let a question to that effect drop in on their conversation. But Yami hadn't said anything to anyone. He just… didn't want to talk about it. No one would really believe him, anyway, if he told them _everything_... they just wouldn't.

Yami had wondered so many times why Kaiba's uncle all the sudden sent him back into a public school. Why were they all the sudden clashing? Yami remembered Kaiba from Dalton talking about how his Uncle was teaching him all he would need to know to take his place in that computer company he ran. Kaiba's father had started the company, and even though it wasn't international, it was known. Kaiba had been so excited about carrying it on… why the sudden change?

Yami shook his head. He had already given himself a headache trying to figure it out before… he wasn't going to start another one now. Instead, he looked around him.

He thankfully recognized the street he was on from that morning on his way to the library—he was pretty sure that there were only a few cafes in downtown Domino that had tables outside at this time of year, and probably only one that had purple umbrellas shading the outside customers from the sun. Maybe he'd get home early, after all.

"Hey, Yami!"

Yami looked over at one of the tables—and saw Anzu sitting there, waving.

"Hi," Yami said, walking over. "Waiting for someone?" He asked, noticing that she was alone.

"No," She said, taking a sip out of a very large milkshake. "I just biked over here for some ice cream. What about you?"

"I was with Yugi at the library—we were working on this project for World History."

"Oh," Anzu said. "I've heard a lot of people talk about that project. They say it's a lot of work."

"Yeah," Yami agreed. "A lot of research, anyway. I don't know about the actual essays and report, but there's a lot of prep work involved."

"Ah," Anzu said, taking another sip. She indicated the chair across from her.

"Sit down," she said. Yami complied, reminding himself that he didn't have to run home straight away— he had about four hours left before six rolled around, and Dad freaked out.

"So," Yami said, "Do you do this often? Sit outside in freezing weather eating ice cream?"

Anzu shook her head.

"No," she said, "I was down here to get a book, anyway, so I just came over here."

"What book?" Yami asked. Anzu leaned over, and pulled a plastic bag onto the table.

"Okay," she said, putting her hand into the bag, "I know this is kind of weird, since girls aren't usually into this kind of thing… but this is what I do when I'm bored."

…And she pulled out a book on how to do card tricks.

Yami stared at its cover for a moment, surprised.

"I have the one on rope tricks at home, but I've finished reading it. So I had to get another one."

Yami was reminded very strongly of someone…he looked up at Anzu.

"You know who Yugi is, right?"

"Yeah," Anzu said, "Why?"

Yami pointed to the book. "He does this kind of stuff all the time."

Anzu raised her eyebrows. "Really?

"Yeah," Yami continued. "His Grandpa owns this little game shop, so it's all right there anyway.."

"Wow," Anzu said, taking another sip of milkshake. "I guess you'd know, wouldn't you?"

"Yeah," Yami agreed, "I hang out with him enough."

"You're the _only _one that hangs out with him," Anzu pointed out.

"…That too…"

"Anyway," Anzu said, swallowing another sip of milkshake, "I've been meaning to ask you about him."

"Why?"

"Well," Anzu said, leaning forward, "You know how people are always making fun of him and just generally spreading rumors, right?"

"Yeah…?"

"There's a new one."

"Oh, really?" Yami asked, raising an eyebrow.

It was odd, that Anzu was suddenly updating him on what rumors were being spread about someone she had never even met. The only other time Yami had mentioned anything about Yugi to Anzu was when he had asked her what she knew about him. Weeks had gone by, and they had just conversed about other things. The fact that she was brining him back up now was making Yami very suspicious.

"What is it?"

"…Let me put it this way," Anzu said, "It has to do with you, too. The both of you."

"So they've dragged _me _into it," Yami said flatly, "How exciting."

"You haven't heard what they've been saying yet," she said.

"Do I _want_ to know?"

"I think you should," Anzu said. "I wanted to ask you if it was true, actually."

"All right," Yami said grudgingly, "Fine. What is all of Domino saying about me behind my back?"

Anzu took a deep breath, obviously preparing herself for whatever Yami's reaction was going to be. Yami noticed that just about everyone who was about to deliver bad news to him did that—everyone that he was acquainted with, anyway.

"That you and Yugi are… well… more than friends."

Yami didn't respond right away—he was too busy giving Anzu wide-eyed look.

"You're kidding."

"No," Anzu said, stirring what was left of the milkshake. "I'm serious."

_Well, great, _Yami thought… _this was not good at all_…

And it wasn't the fact that there was rumor going around about him and Yugi—he could care less about that—it was what the questions around the rumor were about…

Looks like Kaiba didn't have to say anything, after all.

…Unless he _started_ them…

"…Yami? Are you all right?"

"Y—yeah, I'm…fine…" Yami tried to regain his composure, but it didn't work as well as he would have liked it to.

"Is it true?"

"The rumor? No," Yami said dismissively, "Yugi's straight."

"And you're not?"

Yami looked away, and his hand shot up to his neck. It was one of the few times he actually registered the movement.

"No, I'm straight."

But he may as well have jumped on the table and shouted out 'I'm a flaming pouf!' to Anzu, because his attempts at trying to cover it up were so obvious it was pathetic. _Why_ couldn't he put on a decent front!

"Right," Anzu said, a very skeptical tone in her voice. "So you haven't come out yet?"

Yami sighed heavily, and put his face in his hands—tangled chain and all.

"No." He muttered. "And I'm not _going_ to, either."

"Why not?" Anzu asked, "It's not a bad thing. You shouldn't be embarrassed about it."

Yami let his hands flop down on the table—well, his left hand didn't make it all the way down, as it was still tangled in the necklace. He glared at it for a few moments, before pulling his fingers out. _Stupid…_

"I know it's not bad, or anything but—it' s…" Yami trailed off. He was about to go into some dangerous territory there, with someone that didn't need to know.

"It's a long story, all right?"

"All right," Anzu replied, pushing her now empty glass away, "I wasn't asking for an explanation."

"And you'd better not say anything!" Yami snapped, a little more harshly than he had intended to. He needed to work on that…

"Okay!" Anzu said, taken aback by his sudden outburst, "Fine! I'm not going to tell!"

"…sorry," Yami apologized, "I just—"

"Don't want anyone to know. I know." Anzu finished. "I won't tell."

She got up.

"Anyway," she said, looking at her watch, "I should probably be getting home. Mom and Dad are both out of town, and they're coming back this afternoon. And if I'm not there, they'll freak out."

"Yeah, I should go too," Yami said, standing up and pushing his chair in. Anzu paid for her drink, then got her bike from where it was leaned up against the side of the café, and pushed it out into the street.

"Which way are you going?" Yami asked. Anzu pointed down the street.

"I live over there," she said.

"So do I," Yami said, following Anzu's finger.

"Really?"

"Yeah—past the park, and down a ways."

"Which street?"

"46th," Yami replied.

"I live on 45th!"

"Wow," Yami said, as they started off. "Do you walk home, usually?"

"No," Anzu said, as she pushed her bike along, "I go to dance classes, after school."

"Every day of the week?"

"Pretty much," Anzu replied.

"…And I thought it was hard making it to basketball practice twice a week…"

The small talk continued, as they walked out of the downtown area, and the scene changed from tall buildings to large, older houses. They were about to pass the same park that the One-Sided Willow looked over from the other side when Anzu said,

"You know there's a shortcut, right?"

"No."

"It's right down here, actually…follow me."

Anzu led her bike off the sidewalk and across a dead lawn, coming to a stop right next to a thicket, on the other side of which were trees. Yami followed, and looked through the branches that Anzu was holding apart.

"See? You just go straight through the park, instead of walking around. There's even a gravel pathway."

Yami looked, and saw a nicely laid-out pathway twisted off into the trees.

"That's convenient."

"It leads by the school, too," Anzu continued, pushing her bike through a gap in the thicket "I sometimes just go through here, instead of going by the streets. Especially in the springtime. Believe it or not, flowers grow all over the place in here."

And so, they began walking through the park. Yami saw that it was quite scenic, even now in the fall, when things were slowly dying. The leaves hadn't turned to their rich, fall colors yet, but they were starting to. And Yami had a feeling it would look pretty nice, once they did. They slowly climbed the pathway for a while, at a steep incline. Once or twice, Yami could feel the gravel shift under his feet, and his foot would slip back a little.

"Is it like this the entire time?" Yami asked, after a while.

"Once we get to the top," Anzu replied, "It's all downhill." Anzu said over her shoulder. Yami opened his mouth to voice his relief, but—

"Ggk!"

"Yami?" Anzu turned around. Yami stepped back a little, his hands around his neck.

"_Shit_, that hurt…"

"What happened?"

"I—I think I got caught…" Yami reached behind him, and tried to find what the necklace had tied itself to. Anzu leaned her bike against a tree, and walked over.

"Stuck?" she asked. Yami turned as much as the necklace would allow him, and saw that Anzu was looking at the tree branch behind Yami. She had a confused expression on her face.

"How did it get so _tangled_? You were just walking!"

"It does that," Yami said as casually as he could, yanking against it again.

"Here—You're going to break it."

"I doubt it," Yami replied. Nonetheless, he held still.

The silence between them drew out. Yami could hear her fingernails picking at parts of the chain, as she tried to get it undone. He watched what he could from his position, which wasn't much—and that unnerved him.

"Is it almost out?" He asked, after a while.

"No," Anzu replied. "It…looks the same as when I started."

"Oh."

"Maybe we can just break the branch off…"

Yami imagined himself walking the rest of the way home with a branch sticking out from his shirt.

"_Great…_"

"Oh, wait a minute, never mind! I've got it!"

"That's g—"

Suddenly, there was a spark of bright, golden light in the corner of Yami's eye, and a horrible crackling sound. Anzu screamed, and Yami heard gravel shifting.

A wave of panic shot through Yami, and he twisted around to see what had happened. Anzu was nowhere to be seen.

"ANZU!" Yami yelled.

No response.

"_Fuck_!" He hissed, and he strained against the necklace again, only to have it cut into his skin for the third time. He felt his skin rip—he was bleeding.

"ANZU!" he yelled again. There was no reply.

"NO! _Let go_!" he clutched the golden chain with his hands to prevent it from cutting his neck again, and he put all his weight against the branch. He hear it start to splinter, and break.

"Dammit!" Yami yanked even harder, and wrenched the branch downwards. "Come _on—_"

SNAP!

"Agh!"

The gravel below him gave way, pitching Yami back down the steep path. He half stumbled, half fell down the hill, attracting all kinds of jagged, stabbing rocks on his way. When he finally rolled to a stop at the bottom, he immediately jumped to his feet and looked around.

She was sitting not far from him, staring at her hands. Yami looked at them—most of her fingers were red, as though they had been burnt.

"_Shit…_" Yami whispered. He unzipped his jacket, and felt through his shirt for where the pendant was. He didn't feel the clasp next to it. That could only mean that it was out in the open—that the clasp was resting on the back of Yami's neck.

"You tried to take it off…" he asked in a quiet voice, looking at Anzu again, "…didn't you?"

"I—I didn't—I just was going to take it off and—get it untangled!" she stammered, "You were stuck!"

Yami looked away, and wiped what blood he could off his neck. It wasn't much, but it still hurt like hell. He carefully adjusted the necklace so that the clasp was back under his shirt, and sighed heavily.

"Come on," he said, taking Anzu's wrists and helping her up. Once she was standing, he started up the hill again. Once they had gotten to the top, and Yami had retrieved Anzu's bike, and they continued down the pathway.

"Where does this come out?" Yami asked.

"About a block from my house," Anzu replied. "Why?"

"You've got a first aid kit, right?"

"…Yeah…"

"We're going to need it," he said, glancing at Anzu's hands, which she held out in front of her.

For the rest of the shortcut, neither of them said anything. They came out at the other end shortly after, and Anzu took the lead.

Somehow it was understood that Yami was invited in—or maybe that was because Anzu couldn't hold the keys to get the front door open.

"I'll go get the first aid kit," Anzu said, once inside. She started to walk off, but Yami followed. She turned around.

"I'm carrying it," he said.

"But—"  
"You don't want to damage your fingers any further," Yami said. "Trust me."

Anzu nodded, and led the way through her house.

It turned out to be in the downstairs bathroom, near the living room. They decided to go into the kitchen, as the bathroom was very cramped. Yami set the first aid kit down on the table in the middle, and sat down across from where Anzu was already settled. He opened it, and started rummaging through it until he found what he was looking for.

"Hold out your hands."

Anzu obeyed. Three fingers on her right hand and two on her left had gotten burned. Her left thumb was burnt all the way down, on one side.

"Damn," Yami whispered, gingerly touching them to see how much Anzu flinched—which was a lot. "It's worse…"

"Worse?" Anzu asked.

"First burns are bad, but they're not _that_ bad…" Yami said, as he started to bandage the inflicted fingers.

"First burns? It does this to everyone?"

"Anyone who tries to take it off," Yami replied.

"…Why?"

Yami looked up from what he was doing. Part of him just want to run out of the house right then and never set foot in Anzu's vicinity again. But… he knew that was impossible. She had gotten burnt. And she wasn't going to forget something that strange so quickly.

Yami took a deep breath.

"I know this is going to sound really weird, and maybe a little scary, but just listen."

Anzu nodded.

"My necklace burned you because you tried to take it off. It's cursed around my neck, and has been ever since I was ten. It was given to me by my father, who had it cursed around his neck since he was ten, and so on. The scary thing about it is that we're forced to pass it on through the family. Because if we don't, then…" Yami paused, wondering if he should—nah, he wouldn't go that far into it.

"something bad will happen, anyway," he continued. "It would kill a lot of people."

He finished Anzu's right hand in a dead silence. He was about to ask Anzu if she was all right when she said,

"That's horrible."

Yami sighed heavily.

"No…what's horrible is when you try to fight against it."

"…have you?"

"Let me put it this way," Yami said, "I've been wearing this necklace for almost seven years. Over half of them were spent trying to get it off. I've scarred myself permanently."

And he held out his right hand for Anzu to see. Anzu leaned over to look closely. On Yami's first three fingers and part of his thumb, the skin was smooth—here were no crevices at all. She gasped.

"You have no fingerprints!"

"Yeah," Yami said. "If I ever commit a crime, I'll just have to hold everything with this hand." He finished up the last finger, and made sure all the bandages were secure.

"…That must have been painful," Anzu said.

"At first, yeah," Yami said. "After a while, I got used to it. I was too scared to realize it was hurting."

"Scared?" Anzu asked.

"Think about it," Yami said grimly, "How would you feel, if you were ten years old and you had something around your neck that could burn you within an inch of your life? Not to mention anyone else...it can do what it likes, with them."

Anzu moved her fingers, testing how much flexibility she still had.

"You make it sound like the necklace has a mind of its own."

Yami started putting things neatly back into the kit.

"In a sense, it does. If you so much as think about not passing it on, it'll start to heat up around your neck. It can't kill you, because it's depending on you. But it can make your life a living hell. It hasn't done much to me, but… I've heard Dad tell some pretty scary stories."

Yami snapped the lid onto the kit, pushed it to the center of the table, and got up to wash his hands in the sink.

"You'll need to keep those on until they start to feel tight," he said, shaking the water off his hands, "That's when the blisters are forming."

"Blisters!"

"Yeah," Yami said. "They don't leave a scar, though. You'll be fine in about… a week, at the most."

"Oh." Anzu replied. When Yami turned back around, he saw that Anzu was staring thoughtfully at her hands, which were resting on the table. After a while, she said,

"I never thought that were such things as curses. That…that they actually existed."

"Yeah," Yami agreed, "It _is _kind of hard to swallow. But…just because you've never seen something doesn't mean it's not there. I've become a firm believer in the fact that I don't see half of what's going on in the world. I might be a little paranoid, though." And he pulled part of the chain out from under his shirt collar to prove his point.

"Who wouldn't be?" Anzu asked. "It has to be stressful…"

Yami nodded.

"That, and a tendency towards that seems to run in the family."

Anzu smiled.

"I could tell."

Yami frowned, a little.

"…am I that bad?"

"Well…" Anzu said uncertainly.

"I am, aren't I?" Yami said. When Anzu didn't reply, Yami just sighed.

"I'll take that as a yes."

"It's not that no one likes you, it's just… you scare people sometimes."

Yami raised an eyebrow.

"I thought that was because I hang out with Yugi."

But Anzu just shook her head.

"It's more than that."

"…How much have you _heard_!"

"A lot is said," Anzu replied, shrugging.

Again, Yami was reminded of Yugi and his 'I have ears, I can hear' thing under the One-Sided Willow. And when that happened twice in the span of an hour and a half, Yami started to wonder.

"Not that it matters," Anzu continued. "I never believe them, anyway."

"Smart move," Yami said wearily. He looked around the kitchen, and his eyes landed on the microwave, displaying the time.

"Anyway," he said, "I should probably get going."

"Yeah," Anzu said, getting out of her chair. "That'd be kind of weird, if Mom and Dad came home and there was a guy in the house that they didn't know."

Yami laughed. "It's not like I'm going to _do_ anything..."

"They're parents." Anzu said. "The fact that you're here's enough for them."

"True," Yami agreed. "Very true…"

Anzu walked him to the front door, and opened it. Yami picked up his notes from the library, and walked out.

"Thanks for wrapping the burns," Anzu said. Yami nodded.

"And thanks for trying to help me out of the tree," he said. "Even though it didn't work out that well…"

Anzu laughed a little.

"See you Monday," she said.

"Yeah," Yami said, turning to the walkway again. "And tell me if the blisters start doing something weird."

"I will."

And so Yami left, walking down the brick laid pathway and through the small fence. He took the directions Anzu told him (they were short enough to retain), and found that he recognized his street the second he turned onto it—even though it was from the end he never came down.

And after such a long, entirely strange day, this was a comforting realization. Even if it was a bit pathetic.

Yami walked to his house, struggled with the door as usual, and stumbled inside the entrance hallway, after ramming into the door about three times to get it open. He hardly needed to say it, as he was sure the whole house had heard, but—

"I'm home," Yami announced, giving the front door a final shove—just to make sure the lock was actually shut all the way.

"Did everything go all right?" Mom asked, poking her head out of the kitchen. Yami threw his backpack onto the foot of the stairway up to his room, concentrating on keeping his face blank. If there was anything he didn't want to reveal, it was what he had just told Anzu.

"Yeah," he said. "Everything went fine."

"Did you get a lot of work done?"

"Yeah," Yami said, hoping upon hope upon hope that she wouldn't notice anything, even though she would—

But…the most miraculous of things happened.

Mom just nodded, and walked back into the kitchen.

Even though Yami still had a streak of dried blood smeared across the front of his neck.

* * *

A/N: Crazy stuff, ain't it? Blisters… fingerprint deficiencies… cursed jewelry…

P.S.—I've broken a record; Eight whole pages in Word!


	12. Someone's Watching

WOW, GUYS! NO AUTHOR NOTE AT THE BEGINNING!

Oh, wait…

Chapter 12

* * *

Yugi paused before opening the door to the upstairs part of the shop. where he and Grandpa lived. He could sense that things were going to be a lot different in there than they usually were…

Usually, things were much like the library; every once in a while, someone would sniff, or turn a page. But for the most part, he and Grandpa sat in silence, enjoying the other's company while they worked on their respective tasks. Yugi on school assignments, Grandpa on the business.

After dinner, Grandpa might ask Yugi about his day. Yugi would give some general answer, and things would digress into more intellectual topics. Yugi loved debating with Grandpa; he actually knew what he was talking about. Especially when it came to games—go figure. On the weekends, they would play some either new games Grandpa had found, or some old classics. Like Duel Monsters. Well—Grandpa said it was a classic, anyway, even though Yugi felt like he was the only one who knew anything about it. He and Yami's father.

But today… today was what Yugi called an Icky Day. It wasn't a very inventive name, but Yugi was around thirteen when he had come up with the idea. Icky Days referred to those periods of time when you just felt… icky. There was nothing you could do about it, except feel icky for the rest of the day, in hopes that you'd wake up tomorrow not feeling so icky. Usually, it was whenever Mom called. Or when he got harassed at school. Then he had bruises to prove the ickiness.

Slowly, Yugi pulled his key out from his backpack. He didn't _want _an icky day… he never did, but things had been going marginally well lately, as opposed to horrible. He had someone who was crazy enough to be willing to talk to him, and not care about what it meant to everyone else in school. Even if Yugi did tell him about Mom.

He didn't feel too bad about that, either—not as bad as he thought he would, anyway. He thought that if he ever told anyone about that, he'd have to go hide in a cave for a couple of months before the whole thing blew over, and everyone had forgotten.

But the urge to let Yami know about all that was probably that same urge that compelled him to say, "I guess I'll make an exception". An exception in his mistrust…

Yugi shook his head, and shoved the key into the lock. It really _was_ strange, how that had all fallen out…. He pushed open the door, and stepped through.

There was a short section of wall on either side of him that served as the shortest entryway in the world, before it opened out into the living room, with a doorway into the kitchen on the right, and a coat closet on the left. There was a table in the center of the living room, which was longish and cluttered with books and papers of all sorts. Yugi wondered idly if his dice were still on there, before looking up at the occupied seat.

Grandpa was sitting at the end, hands clasped together on the table, just staring at Yugi. Yugi could tell he was trying to figure out a little of what Yugi was feeling right now, just by looking at him.

After all… Yugi had learned whatever he hadn't inherited from the best.

Yugi let his backpack fall to the ground in the doorway to the kitchen, and he walked over to take a seat next to Grandpa. Grandpa followed every movement with observant eyes. Yugi didn't mind; he knew he did the same thing when Grandpa was acting strangely. Anyone else would have been weirded out by it, he was sure. After all, Grandpa had almost the same eyes that Yugi did—possibly even larger. It just wasn't normal to have such large orbs of a strange violet color following you around. Not that normal was a common household word here, either…

"So," Yugi said quietly, "Mother."

Grandpa blinked, and heaved a tired sigh.

"Yes," he said. "Your mother."

"So…What did he call about? The…the guy?"

He couldn't quite bring himself to say 'Fiancée' yet. It just wasn't a word that you fell into, immediately—especially when talking about your own mother, and a man that wasn't your father, even though Yugi's father passed away before Yugi could even remember his face accurately. He didn't really have a say in it, anymore.

Plus, if things had gone that far with her and one guy, Yugi figured he would have to get used to it. Not that he wanted to do _that_, either… after all, Mom was still Mom, no matter where she was.

"Well," Grandpa said, "He actually meant to call us."

Yugi blinked.

"That's different…"

Grandpa nodded. "Your mother dialed up the number, and made sure it was me—then she handed the phone over to him. He started talking to me about how he was going to take care of her. He claimed he would get her to stop drinking, too."

…..

…

Okay.

THIS wasn't computing at all, in Yugi's mind.

"…Wait—" Yugi shook his head, "Run that by me again?"

"This man," Grandpa said, leaning over onto the table, "Is engaged to your mother, and is claiming that he's going to break her bad habits."

…Yugi still didn't get it.

"So he's trying to bring her out of the gutter!"

Grandpa sighed angrily.

"She's not 'in the gutter', Yugi," he said gently.

"Okay—in the drinking gutter," Yugi corrected himself. "She's not _healthy_, anyway…"

There was a silence, as they both tried to absorb this new piece of information. Yugi thought of a question that he almost didn't want to ask; it so loaded. But curiosity shoved it past his lips, and he asked,

"Did she say anything about me?"

Grandpa looked over at him, searching again.

"No," He said. "Neither of them did."

Yugi looked away.

Of course.

…He was beginning to wonder if Mom even remembered him.

"Dandy," he said quietly.

Anyone who didn't know Yugi would assume he was tired, or sick. But in reality, it was his equivalent of anyone else's yelling at the top of their lungs—or whatever normal people did when they flipped out. Certainly it wasn't croaking out their frustrations in a voice barely heard.

Yugi looked over to see that Grandpa had a slightly pained expression on his face, even though Yugi wasn't showing any kind of anger or hurt—he knew that for a fact. Unlike Yami, _he_ knew what he was conveying to the world.

But, he also knew Grandpa could see right through the façade. Even when Mom was still living with them, Grandpa was the one that had always figured out what was bothering Yugi. Now, he sighed, and said,

"I know this is hard—"

"It's not hard," Yugi interrupted in that same quiet voice, shaking his head. "It's just… sick, really."

"It's not—"

"Whatever." Yugi said. He got up.  
"Yugi—"

"I said, 'whatever'." Yugi stated firmly. He walked up the stairs, and into his room.

He didn't want to sound mean—Grandpa hadn't done anything. But at the same time, he didn't think he could act any other way at the moment.

A rare time in history, he was sure.

Yugi fell onto his bed, and closed his eyes. This had to be one of the worst days ever. It was nothing compared to when Mom had actually left, but… it was pretty bad. Really, it just drove home how little she cared about him. And much as he would like to think that he felt the same… he didn't. He may as well just admit it. Dad was still dad, even though he had been dead forever, and Mom was still Mom—even if she was in Mexico engaged to some other guy. Half of Yugi's blood was still hers.

It was a thought that pained him, depressed him, and infuriated him—all at once.

It was icky.

Yugi crawled under the covers of his bed. He wasn't tired—he just felt like curling up into the smallest ball he could, at the moment. He didn't know how long he stayed like that.

But after a while, it got too hot under there. Whipping the covers off, Yugi got out of bed again, really at a loss for what to do.

And that's when his eyes landed on his closet, at the other end of the room.

Yugi didn't know what compelled him to do it. He hadn't looked this far back in ages—years, he was sure. But here he was, on an icky day, trying to find the one thing that was both etched into his mind and shunned from it.

It was right where he had last packed it; in the little cardboard box Grandpa had wrapped a Christmas present in—it had been so long ago when he had started using that box, Yugi had forgotten what he had received in it. But it was a strangely small box, and ever since then, he had kept small things in it. It reminded Yugi of himself, sometimes. Including what was inside.

Slowly, Yugi unwrapped the newspaper surrounding it, and pulled the object carefully out of its nest. He held it in his hands for a moment, then realized that he couldn't see it properly in the closet. So, he walked over to the bed again, and set the object in its old spot—right on the bedside table, next to the lamp.

Yugi quietly sat down directly beside the table and just… stared. It was what he did best.

He stared at that family picture until his eyes watered from a lack of blinking.

He didn't know he had fallen asleep. But the next thing he knew, his eyes were adjusting themselves to the moonlight filtering through a darkened room.

He looked at the picture again. Even though he couldn't see anything through the dim light the moon cast through his window, he knew where everyone in the picture was standing. He knew the tall blob in the left was Dad, smiling. Mom was the blob next to him, looking as if she were truly happy. And the blob between them, holding each of their hands, was a three-year-old Yugi wasn't sure he recognized, anymore. The picture was taken about a month before Dad's plane flight crashed on the way back from a business trip.

Yugi sighed heavily, and turned it away from him. He had looked at it for enough time, tonight.

"Sorry Dad," he whispered. "It's nothing against you."

He knew Dad couldn't hear him. He was dead. But somehow, it helped. He needed to talk to _someone_, anyway… and he was sure that if Dad were there, he'd listen. There was something that told him he would.

He had never known Dad that well. He had heard little things here and there from Mom after he died, but for the most part, he drew a big blank when talking about him.

But he had always had faith in the fact that if he were here, he would listen to Yugi, and talk to him… and just be a good Dad. Maybe it was a wish… maybe it was a hope.

Whatever it was, it made Yugi wonder why he had to pass on so soon, in his life. Really, it just proved that there was no rhyme or reason behind how or when people died. People said it was controlled by someone up there, ticking off numbers on a slate, but Yugi didn't believe it. Yugi had come to stop believing in a lot of things.

He turned over to face the other end of the room, in a motion to get some water from the kitchen. He was awake enough; he had fallen asleep somewhere around three, he remembered that. He felt somewhat hungry, too—he had missed dinner. He looked at the clock on the bedside table; it was 1:10. Grandpa definitely wouldn't be up.

But before Yugi cold scoot off the bed, his eyes did something funny. The other side of the room had seemingly fluctuated a little—as if it were in a pool of water, and Yugi was looking into it.

He shook his head. That was just _slightly_ creepy….

He wondered how eyes did that, anyway…how did they fluctuate so randomly? What part of the eye flipped out that made him see that? Yugi let the more nerdy side of his mind wander, and pondered the thought for a while. When he finally lost his train of thought, and motioned to get up from the bed again—

It happened.

Yugi kept completely still, and widened his eyes to stare at the spot intently.

Now his vision was _really_ playing tricks on him; the wobbling was more focused into lines—a shape. he tried to figure out what it was…

Suddenly, it felt as though he had been doused in ice. He couldn't explain it, but in an instant, the atmosphere in this room was heavier, and colder… more ominous. And if he was seeing this strange trick of the mind right… there was an outline of a person moving around his room. It seemed to be pacing…

_What was going on!_

Yugi cast about his mind to find something that would explain all this, all the while watching as the figure became a more distinct outline—suddenly cold room, strange apparitions—

Ghosts.

Yugi was seeing a ghost.

Yugi kept (if possible) even more still on the bed, tensed. He didn't know what it was like, seeing a ghost, but he had read a book of other people's encounters with them once, and by the sound of most of their stories… Yugi should have been high-tailing it out of the house ages ago.

But now he was interested… transfixed.

The figure took the shape of a man.

Yugi blinked, and tried to see details on the figure. The outline was still very blurry, and very indistinct, but something about it triggered a pang of recognition in Yugi… but he didn't know from where. He raked his mind, trying to figure out what he was reminded of—

Suddenly, he got it. He leaned back to grab the family picture on the other side of the bed, and leaned forward again, watching the figure. It was still moving.

Tilting the picture a little so he could get some moonlight on it he strained his eyes as much as he could to see it properly...

Suddenly, Yugi's mouth went completely and utterly dry. He swallowed, his parched tongue raking against the roof of his mouth, as he forced down some moisture to wet his throat.

"_Dad?"_ he whispered.

The movement stopped.

Yugi's mind gummed up again, like it had in the library that afternoon, and only one question, one set of words struggled to the top of his mind. He swallowed again, and barely whispered,

"_Can you hear me?_"

More movement could be seen, and Yugi could sense that it was getting nearer to him. He sat on the bed, petrified.

As the figure moved closer, it became more distinct. It developed skin, and limbs, and clothes… all of which didn't quite match up with the picture. For one, the skin was dark, and this figure was shorter than Dad in the picture seemed to be. And the clothes! They weren't from this century at all! More like some kind of ancient civilization… like a king from a kingdom long past, hidden in the sands of time.

Last came the face.

And that's when Yugi knew that it definitely wasn't Dad.

Eerie, whitish eyes with darkened pupils stared out at Yugi, unblinking yet alive. A sharp nose, thin lips, and a crown of silvery white on its head amidst spikes of hair slowly stuttered into focus, like a black and white television during a bad storm.

Yugi couldn't move, even if he had wanted to. But right now, he was glued to the figure standing in front of him not five feet away, boring into him with penetrating, haunting eyes. He felt exposed.

The figure became clearer by the moment, now unmoving as it took in Yugi, and Yugi took in the strange figure. He realized it must be a man; its white robes hung over it like it would on a masculine frame. Soon, he saw cascades of silvery bracelets on the man's arms, and some more jewelry around his neck. He was wearing a white robe of sorts, in a style which reminded Yugi of somewhere… he just couldn't remember where.

The figure blinked.

Yugi jumped.

And at this, the figure smiled. It seemed nice enough, but there was something about him Yugi was sensing that wasn't quite as innocent. He took the hint, and didn't smile back. The figure didn't seem to notice, though. He just opened his mouth as if he were taking a breath, and started to speak.

It was a deep, rich voice, colored with an accent from a different language—or maybe many; Yugi couldn't tell.

"Yugi." It said. Yugi jumped at the mention of his name. He looked up—the figure was just staring at him, waiting for him to respond. Yugi opened his mouth to talk, but nothing came out.

"You are Yugi?" the figure asked.

Yugi shut his mouth and nodded dumbly. The figure gave a nod.

"I thought you were."

Wait—_he thought! He thought he knew Yugi!_

"Who _are_ you?" he managed to croak out. "And how do you know my name?"

the figure merely smiled somewhat sadly.

"I've known you for a long time," he said. "We all have been waiting."

Yugi just stared at the figure. Who had been waiting? What for? How long?

Of course, none of these questions found the way to his mouth in time, before the figure spoke again.

"But now, something has happened. Something very big. I have come to you to tell you…be ready."

"….ready?" Yugi rasped. "For what?"

But at this, the figure smiled that saddened smile again and vanished—much more quickly than he had appeared.

Instantly afterwards the cold atmosphere lifted, and Yugi could feel his fingers again.

"For what!" he asked aloud again, in the off-chance that the strange figure would hear him as he dispersed to wherever he had gone off to.

But there was no response.

Yugi lay back down on his bed, completely awake now, and shivering. He crawled under his covers, stomach forgotten, as the tried to comprehend what had just happened.

And all the while, the family picture lay face up next to him, faces shining in the silvery, ghostly moonlight.

It was hard for Yugi to get out of bed that morning. Even though he wasn't tired, he still felt somewhat cold. At first he thought the atmosphere of the ghost was still lingering in his room, but then Grandpa came in and told him that if it had rained last night, he wouldn't have had school today due to ice and snow. As it was, it was just cold enough to be aggravating and just ice-less enough for school.

And so, Yugi rolled out of bed to a colder, yet somewhat less icky day than yesterday. He got ready for school automatically; there was no thought involved in the actions, and besides—his mind was still hooked on last night. He had a feeling it would be for a while. Not that it mattered—Mr. Dither probably wasn't going to be going over anything new today or the next. Mrs. Roberson might be throwing some slightly different math problems at them, but it wasn't anything to be worried about at all.

Really, Yugi was facing another boring, lifeless school day.

He came down to get his backpack, then into the kitchen to grab some kind of breakfast. Grandpa was at the living room table, sitting in his seat at the end, reading the morning paper.

As Yugi scrounged around for something edible, he wondered…

"Hey, Grandpa?" he asked, coming over to the table with a bowl of cereal.

"Hm?"

"…Do you know any places nearby that are haunted?"

Grandpa looked up from his paper, thinking for a moment.

"…Not that I know of," he said. "Why do you want to know?"

"Something for World History," Yugi lied—he wasn't going to tell Grandpa about what happened last night. Not yet, anyway. "We were talking about haunted places yesterday."

"Ah."

Yugi ate the rest of his cereal in silence, as he often did. Grandpa had been living in this very building for a long time; he would have known something about a recent ghost. So that…ancient figure Yugi saw last night wasn't just a ghost.

It had told him something, too. Was that normal, for a ghost to talk to you? Yugi remembered what he said as clearly as if Grandpa had just spoken to him;

"_Something very big has happened. Be prepared."_

Yugi shook his head, trying to get rid of that confused, scrambled feeling. What did it all mean? And that other bit;

"_I've known you for a long time, Yugi…"_ To Yugi, that just sounded eerie.

Then, a startling realization hit him, and he visibly tensed.

What if the figure had been watching him? What if he had been watching him for a long time? And that's how he knew about him? And if that were the case, what else did he know?

Yugi tried to hide his shock from Grandpa, and he left for the bus a little earlier than usual.

The idea of someone else spying on him was more unnerving to Yugi than the ghost had been. After all; seeing was believing, for Yugi. He saw the ghost; they must be real.

But the things that he couldn't see were the ones that worried him; like a potential spy… ugh.

Icky thoughts for another icky day.

At least nothing exciting was happening in his classes… after yesterday and last night, he didn't think he could handle anything else without snapping.

* * *

A/N: Three guesses as to who gave Yugi the mysterious message, and the first two don't count!

Something I didn't realize until this chapter—both Yami and Yugi had something big happen to them when they were ten.

Hehe—sometimes I wonder if I ever _left_ age ten…

_(looks around at now completely silent room)_

erm….Anyway...


	13. and the fists fly

A/N: I know—took me long enough, right? Dern thing called life again… between isolating bacterial genes and understanding trig identities, I've been pretty busy.

And thanks, everyone, for telling me these babbles before and after the fic's chapters are worth something. It makes me want to pull out the warm fuzzies again. _(yay!)_

I apologize in advance for how Yugi's treated in this chapter; things just aren't going well for him at the moment, and I need to have him all irked for chapter fourteen or fifteen…or sixteen, depending on how long-winded I want to get about things.

And yeah, Joey's kind of mean. Sorry about that. I think he'll get better… I haven't decided yet. Bwahaha…

His accent kind of came back, too; I know for a couple chapters I said he was going to lay off a bit on it… but it's too fun to write. I missed it so.

Chapter 13: …and the fists fly.

* * *

The bus stop was cold as hell.

Yugi pulled his jacket tighter around himself, and turned his back to the blast of freezing wind that headed up the street. He knew it was going to be frigid, but he didn't think it was _this_ bad…the guy standing next to him kept looking down at Yugi, a little concerned. Yugi rolled his eyes and faced the street again. Knowing his luck, the guy probably thought he was trying to get to the elementary school that was across the street from Domino High.

Someone had actually asked him that, once. And, being Yugi, he had just given her what he thought was a decent glare, and croaked out that he was fifteen—which he was, at the time.

That was only about a year ago, Yugi realized now.

He huddled further into himself as another gust of wind battered around him, and chased the memory away—he didn't want to make things ickier than they already were.

He thought back to Mom again, for the zillionth time since last evening. It just didn't make sense, her marrying a man who was going to break her habits.

To Yugi, she _couldn't _break habits. She never had been able to when she was still living here…what was so phenomenal about this random guy she had found? In Mexico, no less?

The bus came.

Yugi sighed, and dismissed the thought for later. He didn't want to think about it with other people staring at him.

And stare they did. Yugi just fixed his eyes on the window, and watched all the cars commute by, mounds of dislodged frost piled onto the edges of every windshield. He could sense that at least one nosy woman on the other side of the aisle was stealing glances at him, resisting the urge to ask why he was going to school alone—but the cars at least kept him from giving everyone the creeps by staring back at them. They probably wouldn't appreciate that. No one ever seemed to.

And as much fun as that would be, he didn't want to cause a disturbance. He didn't want to be out here at all. He really wished he didn't have to go to school that day.

But, it was kind of late for that now.

More people stared when he got off at the stop near Domino.

Whatever.

Of course, the wind was blowing even harder when he stepped off—right into his face. It froze every inch of exposed skin immediately, and he had to stop to rub some feeling back into his face about three paces from the bus stop. After a moment, he continued on again, figuring if he got frostbite, he'd miss world history while trying to save whatever afflicted appendage in the nurse's office. Another wave of wind crashed into him, and he hurriedly wrapped his jacked around him more tightly. He didn't know what it was about this wind; it was extremely disorienting…but that may have been because Yugi couldn't keep his eyes open for more than a minute—it was blowing too hard.

And misfortune had it that the one time he wasn't fully aware of his surroundings was the day he was followed. If he had chanced to look around, Yugi would have noticed the suspicious gait of two figures coming towards him, wrapped in what looked like numerous layers of thin sweatshirts, faces concealed behind thick scarves.

Instead, Yugi slowed to a stop about a block from the school, pulling his fingers out of his gloves to clamp them around his ears—he was sure they were going numb…

At that moment, the two figures saw their chance—and pounced.

Yugi barely had time to breathe, before he was facedown in a rock-hard patch of grass just off the sidewalk. He could feel the blades crunch and melt underneath the warmth of his forehead, and he heard voices above him laugh.

"S'been a while, hasn't it?" one of them said.

Yugi closed his eyes. He knew the voice well—probably better than anyone else's, save for his Mom and Grandpa. That wasn't a good thing, either. Then again…the whole situation wasn't.

"Come an—you're nat goin' ta just lay theah! Get up!"

Yugi held back what he wanted to vocalize, and took the pain of the kick in his side silently. He figured out a while ago that it cut down on the time they spent actually hurting him; he just had to be so unresponsive that he sucked all the fun out of it for them. He was good at that…

Another kick.

Today, though, he seemed more pissed off that usual—

Ow—!

Okay, both of them did.

Yugi curled up a little, as the kicks gained more power from both sides. Some of them missed their target and got his backpack instead, but most were dead on; in his side, mostly. Some got his arms, and a few got his head. Those were going to hurt the most, Yugi knew; kicks in the head lasted a while.

Ever since he started soccer, he'd gotten pretty good at this.

"Get UP, Midget! You don't want me ta make ya!"

"Why not?" Yugi managed to croak out.

A handful of his hair was grabbed by a calloused fist, yanking him upwards to a kneeling position, and a pair of furious brown eyes with a sneer half hidden by red plaid were his reply. Somehow, the brightness of the scarf didn't soften the legitimacy of the glare at all. Yugi just stared back at Joey, eyes blank as ever.

Another good kick, and Yugi was bent over again, clutching his stomach as if it were about to fall out into the frozen grass in front of him. His breakfast churned inside him, threatening to make another appearance.

"That's why! Get up!"

Yugi remained still.

"God_DAMMIT_!" Joey yelled, kicking Yugi as hard as he could in the side.

_That_ was going to hurt for a couple weeks…

"_Get up, Midget_!" he growled.

_What if I don't want to?_ Yugi thought. He quickly chased the thought away. The day he got the courage to say _that_was the day hell would freeze over. Then again, it was cold enough out here…and cold sank. Maybe it would sink as far as hell, one day… then something would happen. It just had to be cold enough often enough to get down there.

He was pulled roughly to his feet by the hands of the goon behind him. It didn't matter who it was—they obviously wanted to keep themselves anonymous. Most of them did. Not that Yugi would ever go tattling; he'd tried that once and it had failed miserably. But they still felt the need to save themselves some kind of dignity, or feed whatever miniscule conscience they had. And so they remained behind Yugi, or above him, when they had knocked him to the ground.

Yugi's eyes did a quick sweep over Joey, who was leering at him now. He saw his hands flexing into a fist, then relaxing again. Yugi felt his insides suddenly chill, as he thought about what that meant. He braced himself mentally, while keeping that same, painfully blank expression pasted onto his face.

The first punch was right where it always was—right across the jaw. Yugi let the force of the hit take him down again, as far as the goon would let him go before he took a handful of Yugi's coat and shoved him back to where he was. Only milliseconds after, Joey's fist struck him again. He fell, then got pulled back up. Hit. Fall. Pull. Hit. Fall. Pull. Hit—

Yugi felt the hands let go of him suddenly, and he slumped to the ground, blood flecking onto the grass below him. The sounds of men's dress shoes were heard, clicking distantly against the frosty pavement.

The administrator had just started to patrol the front of the school. And even though he wasn't on school grounds yet, Yugi knew that one could see quite a ways down the straight, even sidewalk from the front of Domino.

But there also happened to be a tall hedge of bushes lining the school grounds, which blocked the view of anything further in than the pavement. Yugi was invisible, to him. Joey and the goon weren't completely stupid.

Yugi stayed still for a long moment, letting the cold air around him seep into his still body, freezing it from the inside out. He wiped off what blood he could onto his red gloves—a strange coincidence Yugi could only wonder about. Even that simple motion caused newly bruised muscles in his sides to flare up in pain.

It was a good thing, Yugi told himself—it meant all his nerves were still intact. Of course, it also meant he'd have to deal with it… he groaned, inwardly. He didn't want to deal with pain…not now…

He supposed he'd gotten used to it, not feeling the results of the last bullying. He'd gotten used to feeling healthy all the time, and having all his muscles in working order. He realized how much of a luxury that was, now.

He made sure there wasn't any blood on his face before it all dried—a hard feat, considering the wind—then slowly lifted himself off the ground. The spatters of blood shone dark against the grass, forming a scattering of circles of partially melted frost. His nose felt numb. And his middle…oh, god, it hurt to _stand_…

Yet there wasn't anything he could do about it now. Step by step, he made it the rest of the way to Domino, past the imposing stance of the administrator, and into the building. There weren't that many students left in the hallways—homeroom was about to start any second.

Yugi picked up his pace the best he could without looking like he was limping, and walked the hallways as fast as his aching middle would permit him. He stumbled into homeroom, barely making the bell.

Unfortunately, everyone else heard him almost fall flat on his face, and turned to stare at him—including Mrs. LeGrange. And judging by their surprised expressions, he still looked pretty bad.

He couldn't this. He couldn't face them now… he was hurting too much. The older students wouldn't ask questions, but the new ones would—

Yami would. And he probably wouldn't give up until he'd dragged something out of him, either.

He turned back to Mrs. LeGrange, and asked,

"May I go to the nurse?"

Mrs. LeGrange gave him a good look over with her dull, old eyes.

"Yes," she wheezed, turning to her attendance sheet, "I'll mark you present."

Yugi just nodded, and left the room again. Once outside, he stopped for a moment, holding his middle. They had really gotten him good, this time…_really _good.

It was only when the door to the nurse's office was opened that Yugi remembered the old nurse had retired last year. Her replacement was a middle-aged woman whose face instantly filled with concern, when she set her eyes on Yugi. Yugi was thrown for a moment, remembering how the other nurse would simply ask him what hurt, where it was, and fix it for him. She had been a woman of few words—and questions.

THIS lady, Yugi soon found out, was the exact opposite. From the moment he set foot in the door, she started asking questions about what happened. Yugi supposed it was the normal thing to do, but he'd been so used to silence as his numerous scrapes and cuts were cleaned that he found himself stammering out lame answers, just to get her to stop prying.

The only problem was… she didn't. And she became really suspicious, when Yugi's story started to change, as she asked the same questions again. Finally, Yugi just stated what he thought would have been obvious after the first question—

"I just don't want to talk about it."

The nurse paused, looking him over with a scrutinizing eye.

"It looks like you need to," she said. Yugi wrapped his arms around his middle again, without really thinking about it.

"I will when I want to," he said quietly. His mind added, _When that cold finally sinks to hell…_

"You sure?"

Yugi slowly nodded, staring at the ground. This whole compassion thing she was pulling off was something Yugi wasn't all to familiar with. He felt like it was shaking his barriers a little more violently than they needed to be shaken, right now—it was a feeling he hadn't felt in years.

The nurse sighed, and kneeled on the ground beside the chair Yugi had settled into.

"All right… let's see about this scrape…."

It was amazing that it was only a few minutes into first period by the time Yugi got out of that office. He probably would have stayed longer, if the nurse had seen him get up and sling his backpack over his shoulders again. He grit his teeth as the full effects of what had happened started sinking into his skin, and outwardly grimaced. And he knew it was bad when his face started to project what was inside. In Yugi, it was a rare happening.

Looks like enough kicks from a soccer player and his goon could bring it out in him.

* * *

Yami looked up with the rest of the class, when he heard a scuffling at the door, and his eyes widened in shock immediately.

Yugi was standing there, clutching onto the knob as though he would fall without it. His hair was disheveled, and his uniform was wet, and dirt stains were everywhere. There was a tear in the elbow, and another one in the side. He was hunching over a little bit, like he couldn't stand up straight.

The worst part of it was his face. That blank, dead look his eyes had made Yami's insides clench, as they scanned over the room. There were smears of something that didn't look like dirt around his nose…

"May I go to the nurse's office?" a small, somewhat hoarse voice croaked out to Mrs. LeGrange. She paused, looking him over for a moment.

"Yes," she finally said, "I'll mark you present."

Yami was about to get up to try and help Yugi there, since he didn't look like he could get across the hall on his own—

But Yugi was gone before he could even move. How he managed to get out so fast was beyond Yami completely. He let go of the sides of his desk, still staring where Yugi had been.

"Worried?"

Jenny, the girl who sat in front of him, had on an innocently concerned expression that even Yami could tell was fake. His eyebrow arched up.

"Yes," he said, "as he is my friend, and I've never seen him like that."

That façade of hers turned into a smirk, and some of her other friends around her did the same.

"Are you sure you're _just_ friends?"

"Yes," Yami said, his eyes narrowing. "Sorry to disappoint you."

"I'm not disappointed," she said, "More like the opposite."

"Oh?"

Jenny smiled again. "You have the whole school wondering about you. I'm just glad it's not true."

Yami would have responded to that comment, but the bell ending homeroom rang, and he decided it wasn't worth the time to stay where he was and delve into the implications of that remark..

Plus, other things were on his mind, as he made his way to World History. Yugi was certainly one of them. But another one had to do with that rumor Jenny had mentioned… or rather, the start of it…

He was unusually early to World History, and was proud of himself—until he remembered that all his stuff was in his locker. And he happened to notice it too late; he wasn't sure if he could run there and back, now; his locker was pretty far away from Mr. Dither's room.

And so he sat there, arms crossed, in an empty classroom. Even Mr. Dither was gone. Must have gone off to make copies, or something…

Yami heard the swish of clothes, as someone else came into the room. He looked up.

Kaiba didn't acknowledge his presence, as usual. He settled down in the seat behind Yami. Yami could hear him take out some things, and the rusting of paper. Without moving, Yami asked,

"Happy?"

The rustling of papers hesitated for a moment, then began again.

"You heard me," Yami stated.

"I didn't understand your question," Kaiba's voice responded coolly.

"So you just ignored it?"

"It seems to work best," Kaiba said.

Yami sat up, and turned in his seat to look at Kaiba.

"So _that's_ been your strategy," he said, staring straight at Kaiba's forehead; his eyes were focused on the work in front of him. "Ignore me, and I'll eventually shut up."

"It worked for a while," Kaiba said, in that same calm, distant voice. "I was enjoying the quiet."

"Oh, _really_?" Yami asked, feigning extreme interest. Kaiba looked up.

"Yes," he replied, "Why? Were you missing the fact that you didn't have anyone to get pissed off at?"

"Bullshit," Yami said. "You _knew_ it. You were the _only one _that knew."

Kaiba blinked, and his gaze became, if possible, colder than it was before.

"You think _I_ started that pathetic rumor about you and Yugi?"

"Yes, I do." Yami retorted, his voice suddenly terse. "Who else would?"

Kaiba cleared his throat, and set his pen down carefully, taking on the air of a businessman explaining something to an underling over his imposing desk.

"As much as I hate to admit it, not everyone is completely stupid. Some are perfectly capable of making deductions on their own. Not that you would understand this; any logic that was in that scattered mind of yours has withered away from neglect."

There was a sudden wave of murmurs from around them. Yami blinked, and looked to see the rest of their World History class staring at them, wide-eyed. Not a second afterwards, the tardy bell rang.

Kaiba picked up his pen and started to write again. Yami could feel his temper flaring up quickly—the way it usually did when around Kaiba.

"If you weren't around," he growled, "I'd believe that."

"What, that you have no brain?"

"That you didn't start it, smartass!" Yami snapped. Whatever whispers were flitting across the room were now silent.

Kaiba stared at him, extremely skeptical.

"And how does my being here immediately qualify me for spreading rumors? You have no evidence other than the fact that you don't like me."

"And that," Yami retorted, "Is plenty. Especially considering it's _you_."

"I haven't done anything to you since I came here," Kaiba stated. Yami noticed his voice finally start to slightly increase in volume, and his glare hardened. "Why I would start now is completely beyond me. The only reason I can think of that I would is to increase your paranoia."

"I'm not paranoid! After—" Yami stopped himself. He had almost spilled again. That was the second time in a week… this was not good. He shook his head, and turned back around to face the front.

"Forget it. I can't say anything here, anyway."

"But _I _can," came a malicious voice behind him. Yami looked over his shoulder. Before he could spit out a threat, Kaiba continued,

"You were about to say, 'After what happened at Dalton, I shouldn't even be within ten feet of you.' Or something along those lines, yes?"

Yami was silent. He wasn't going to get into this. Not here….Anzu knowing part of it was bad enough, even if she didn't seem that scared by it. He heard a low, dry laugh behind him.

"How typical. You can't even trust yourself to talk, your will is so weak." He paused, clearly for dramatic effect. Yami kept his mouth shut. Kaiba spoke again.

"If you want to say anything else to me, go ahead. I'm sure they're all waiting for something inspirational to fall out of your mouth. Or maybe I should just tell them they're waiting in vain?"

Another wave of murmurs rolled through the classroom, and people started talking. Yami just stared ahead, brewing. He'd get Kaiba for this… even if Kaiba didn't start it, he sure as hell deserved some kind of beating—

The door opened. And again, Yami's eyes widened.

Yugi came walking in, looking as if nothing had happened. His hair was straight again, he was walking properly, and his face was clean. There was still evidence that something had happened; there was still dirt on his clothes (though a lot less), and his expression still looked dead. The murmurs continued as he walked in and took his seat; whether they were still talking about Kaiba's comment, or about Yugi's walking in, Yami didn't know.

When Yugi sat down, Yami leaned over.

"Hey, Yugi."

Yugi didn't respond.

"Yugi?" Yami asked again, in a louder voice.

Yugi still didn't answer.

"I don't think he's gonna talk anytime soon."

Yami turned to Joey, and was surprised to see his usually mischievous expression exchanged for a more grim, strained look.

"What do you mean?"

"What I said," Joey replied.

Yami stared at Joey for a moment, trying to figure out why things didn't feel right. He turned back to Yugi.

"Yugi!" he said. Finally, Yugi slowly turned his head just enough so that he could see Yami out of the corner of his eye.

"What happened? You looked dead in homeroom—"

"Ya went ta homeroom?" Joey cut in. Yami felt his eyebrows shoot up, surprised at how suddenly harsh and menacing he sounded. Yugi's head snapped back to the front of the room.

"Why would you care, Joey?" Yami asked, "He goes every morning."

Joey remained silent, glaring a hole into the back of Yugi's head.

"And why are you so pissed about it?" Yami continued, overwhelmed with a need to snap at whatever spoke, "Was he not supposed to? Do you get to tell him what days he goes and doesn't go? I don't think so. Besides—he doesn't look very happy about it. Come to think of it, he doesn't look very happy about you asking. I don't think he likes you very much at all—"

"Hey."

Yami, Joey, and Yugi turned to Jim, who was looking at Yami.

"This doesn't have to do with you."

Yami, however, merely raised an eyebrow.

"So I can tell," he replied coolly. "And yet…" he indicated the desk he was sitting in, "here I am. A part of the circle."

They all took a moment to realize that Yugi, Joey, Jim, and Yami were in fact sitting in a circle of desks, all next to each other.

Joey sighed angrily, and slouched in his seat.

"Just stahp it, Yami," he said, "We don't wanna heah ya tempeh tantrums."

That earned him a very mean glare from Yami.

"Temper tantrum! What about you? Just because you're pissed doesn't mean you get to harass people! Me or Yugi!"

"STAHP IT!" Joey yelled suddenly, killing whatever whispers were flitting through the room.

"Oho!" Yami said quietly, taking in how Joey seemed to be ready to pounce on him. "Did I strike a nerve?"

"Yami."

Yami blinked, and turned to see two purple orbs staring at him, full of desperation.

"Just stay out of this."

Yami stared at Yugi for a moment, trying to figure out what it all meant.

"Why?" he asked.

Yugi's eyes darted to the floor.

"Just—Just don't get involved," he said, his voice decreasing in volume with every syllable.

"Ya heahd what he said," Joey growled, leering a little closer.

At this point, Yami paused in his reply. The more logical side of his brain was telling him to stop here, since his nosing in wasn't wanted by either party. But there was another, more irrational side of his brain that didn't like things being kept from him—especially things as strange as this. Couple that with how Joey was acting, and how it seemed to have something to do with what Yugi looked like this morning, and the brash side won. Whether for good or for ill, Yami plunged onward.

"You know what happened to Yugi this morning, don't you?"

Joey's fist was faster than Yami ever would have guessed. Caught by surprise, he fell backwards out of his seat onto the floor next to the windows, flat on his back. However, it was only for mere milliseconds; the pain in his jaw broke whatever restraints Yami was using, and he was on his feet before Joey had put his arm down. Joey seemed a little surprised, which caused Yami to laugh darkly.

"I guess that's my answer." He stated calmly, clenching both his hands to fists. "But why are you so worked up about it? Guilty conscience?"

Before Joey even had time to blink, Yami hit him across the jaw on one side, then the other. When Joey shook it off, Yami drove his fist as hard as he could into Joey's stomach. And by the bug-eyed look and how Joey fell over, Yami could tell he had hit his target; Joey's diaphragm. Yami leaned over to stare down at him.

"If it doesn't hurt to breathe, I'll try again."

Someone cleared his throat behind him. At first, Yami thought it was Kaiba—it sounded official enough. But Kaiba was looking behind Yami, smirking. Yami's eyes widened. If it wasn't Kaiba…it was—

Mr. Dither, arms crossed, was looking over his glasses at Yami with a severely stern expression on a pinched face.

"I'd be thankful you didn't permanently damage his pattern," he said, "_That_ would result in expulsion."

Yami and the rest of the class merely stared wide-eyed at Mr. Dither, waiting for what he had to say next.

"As it is," he sighed, "You are both at fault. Therefore, you both are going to face the consequences. Since this is your first offence, Yami, you only get detention. Although," he looked over at where Joey was sitting up now, clutching his stomach. "If I had mandated the rules of this school, you'd be suspended along with him. As it stands, first offence is a detention, and the second is a detention with two days suspension. If you don't come to my room after school today, you'll be spending a few days out of school before we try to set up another time to carry out your first punishment."

And with that, he walked to the front of the room, turned to the silent class, and said,

"Open your books to chapter 17, section three. I believe this is where we left off yesterday…"

* * *

(A/N: I know—in real life, Yami would be spending ten days in a little room doing homework every day in ISS. But this is the fiction world, and I didn't want to put anything permanent on Yami's record. After all, he _is _planning on going to college, and he wants to look good on the records.)

**sakura-dream:** I'm probably just about as excited about writing this story as you are reading it. Needless to say, I'm posting these chapters as fast as I can write them properly. Things are good in the world.

**Hikari's-dark-side-:** I'll get to it—I just have to settle a few other things first (like this detention everyone's been sentenced to…). It's coming, though! Keep reading to find out!

**Crimson Eyed Dragon:** I know what you mean—I was getting all depressed that no one had reviewed my story, because nothing was in my inbox—then I check my stats on and there they are! Waiting for me! Rrrg…

**Gylzgurl: **YAY! Fred, you have made my Day! I know this is obsessive, but it was bugging me that I had 59 reviews. You made it a nice even 60! And as for Galiana….that's GREAT! Hrmm, now what will she look like..? _(Trem ponders_)… can't wait to see what you're going to do with that. And we really need to write that prologue.

**Master Elora Dannan: **Funny that they both took the news so admirably, don't you think?

**hAdOwCat: **Oh, the possibilities…

**cutehelenjames: **Ooh! I've _always_ wanted to go to Germany… or anywhere outside the U.S., for that matter. _(sigh)_. But I don't mind the delay—it was a much shorter one than what I've put you guys through for this chapter!

**R.Wolfsbane**: It's not exactly soon, but… its' an update! Glad you like it!

**SilverLily aka Blood Moon: **Hehe, everyone's rooting for that to happen. But if it actually _will_ is debatable…bwahaha. I'm glad you like it, though. I know I'm saying that every other review response, but I mean it!


	14. Lurks, Irks, and Turns

A/N: Pretty nice chapter title, I think. Lurks is what's going on with Yugi, Irks is what's going on with Yami, and Turns is what's going on in Jim's mind.

Enjoy, everyone.

Chapter 14: Lurks, Irks, and Turns.

* * *

There was no way in hell this was happening. He just wasn't seeing this. 

Yugi thought it was bad being interrogated by the nurse… he had no idea Yami would get so involved.

Well—truth be told, he had rather _hoped_ Yami wouldn't get involved. Yami, Yugi had deducted over the time he had known him, had a tendency to just jump into things, then stand by whatever indecencies his choice dealt out to him later. And the scene playing out in front of Yugi right now was no different.

At first it seemed tame; Joey snapped at Yugi, and he didn't answer back. He didn't answer Yami, either, out of the simple realization that he couldn't.

Yeah, he had gotten cleaned up by the nurse, and he was keeping that mercifully blank mask plastered on his face with Herculean efforts, but…he still felt as though it would all fall over and shatter on him if he so much as tried to convince Yami nothing was wrong. Inside, he was screaming to turn around and give Yami some pile of crap to throw him off the track…but he knew he just didn't have that kind of energy right now—the energy to force down every ounce of feeling that was boiling inside of him, and to fill up that very top layer of turmoil with something that wasn't quite so shocking, or vulgar; a pleasant depression.

Usually he could pull it off; from the very beginning, it had been Yugi's saving grace in any trying situation. But after that morning, Yugi felt as if every ounce of energy inside of him had been drained out through his blood and bruises onto the lawn back outside, amounting to nothing more than little red spots in the grass. They were probably frozen by now…

He felt again his willpower wavering, like it had in the nurse's office. He was startled at the sensation—especially in the middle of the World History classroom, while they were waiting for Mr. Dither to come back. It was then that he started to hear the angered voices from behind him.

Something really bad must have happened to Joey. Last time he yelled at someone in class was in middle school; Yugi remembered that incident quite well—and he didn't want it repeated here.

Yugi saw the anger rising in Yami's eyes before he even said anything. And that's when a gut-level jolt of fear and apprehension came over Yugi, as he remembered that look—he'd seen it before, on someone else who had been his friend...the only other person Yugi had ever known that he could really call a friend.

This time, however, Yugi did something he hadn't done the first time. He turned around, faced the tension of a conflict inches away from violence to croak out something to the effect of "STOP IT!", in his own weird way.

Predictably (and unfortunately), Yami didn't seem to get it. On the contrary, he just gave Yugi an almost disgusted expression; as if the idea of stopping was worthy of spitting on.

Yugi turned back to the front when Joey threw the first punch, feeling waves of apathy wash over him as he heard Yami fall backwards onto the floor. He closed his eyes, and tried to think of something else.

Two fights in one day… he didn't think he could handle this…not surprisingly, he really didn't deal with witnessing violence well.

By the exclamations of the rest of the classroom, he guessed that Yami won out. He only looked back again when the room had gone silent, and Mr. Dither was talking to Yami. Joey was on the floor, directing a scowl of surprise and anger at Yami. At this, Yugi raised his eyebrows, glad something was going right today;

Hadn't he predicted Yami would be able to fight Joey off for a while?

But even at that, Yugi knew that it was only one person Yami had fought against. And with that fight, he had just turned the heads of every one of Joey's friends and goons (as Yugi called the more intellectually challenged of Joey's social circles) in his direction. Sooner or later, the army of one wouldn't be able to fight the army of many. He would see that his cause was too weak, too frivolous to defend so fervently.

And then it would all be over. Yugi would be friendless again. Everything would be the same as it was before.

It wasn't a day Yugi was looking forward to, he had to admit.

Mr. Dither didn't cover nearly what he wanted to cover in class that day, and he seemed very irked by it. How surprising, Yugi thought, as he left the classroom. Teachers always got slightly thrown off when they had to break up a fight.

Unfortunately, Mrs. Robertson wasn't doing anything interesting that day, either. People couldn't seem to get the concept of a quadratic equation in vertex form, so she spent the whole period working on that. Yugi may as well have not paid attention; it was so simple to him it was mind-numbing.

Yet pay attention he did. He didn't have anything else to do; he had finished with his book he had brought, and he really didn't want to think about what had happened last period.

Especially since Yugi was starting to feel strange—as if something entirely unpleasant was swimming around within his mind, threatening to surface. Sometimes there was no seeable reason for it, other times there were; it just depended. Yugi often wondered if that feeling had a mind of its own, and moved to make itself known whenever it felt like it.

It was also then that Yugi questioned his sanity. After all, how many people gave a feeling conceived in their consciousness a name and a personality?

And Yugi could feel it lurking closer to his surface than he could ever remember, this time. It was scary. He could feel it in how tightly he held his pencil while checking answers Mrs. Robertson read out, in how tense every muscle in his body was, even though he was just sitting in his seat—even in how he spoke, though it was in that same quiet way he usually talked. Everything just seemed to have an…anger behind it, almost, a lurking feeling of irrational violence.

Yugi shook his head, for the zillionth time, and tired to concentrate on the math problem in front of him. He was starting to scare himself.

Seriously.

* * *

So Joey beat Yugi up. 

Yami felt his eyebrows knit together again in a scowl just thinking about it. He knew that this was serious; he could see it in how desperate Yugi looked, when he told Yami to stay out of it. He just looked… scared, almost. No ordinary bully could instill that kind of fear into someone with a single fight, Yami knew. This had to have been happening for a while. And that's what made him mad. This wasn't just a one-time thing—he just knew it. And why he hadn't paid attention to the signs leading up to this, he didn't know.

Then again, even now he wouldn't know what he should have looked for. No one had said anything that he knew of… and that was the only way Yami could tell, about things like this—an annoying trait of his that he could kick himself for right now.

He remembered thinking about the rivalry between Yugi and Joey when he first came here—how there was much more to Yugi than what met the eye. But it wasn't the same thing that Joey was making fun of Yugi for. Now more than ever Yami wanted to know what exactly Joey was targeting Yugi for—after all, Yugi was his friend; he felt like he needed to stand up for Yugi, even if he didn't know what Joey had done to him. It just… seemed like the right thing to do.

Yami let his stuff fall in front of a locker that was quite isolated from where the rest of the guys were changing for gym. He didn't feel like facing Honda and Jim today; for obvious and very good reasons.

Just as the bell rang, however, Yami heard someone sit down next to him, and the locker next to his open. Looking up, Yami had to keep from yelling something obscene; there was Jim, calmly putting his school books into the gym locker.

Yami just glared at him stiffly for a moment, to let him know that he wasn't welcome, then continued getting ready for whatever was planned for that day without a word.

Well—not until he took his shirt off, anyway. With World History still very fresh on his mind, just thinking about it made him feel like punching Joey's brains out all over again. What he actually did was to pull his shirt over his head a little too quickly. The pyramid ended up stuck in the tag on the back of the collar.

"Stupid—!" Yami spat, glaring at the small golden triangle. Hadn't it caused him enough grief already for one **week!** And it was only Monday, for christ's sake…

It didn't help when Yami noticed that Jim had paused in pulling his socks on to watch as Yami struggled to free the necklace again. It was for a good minute he sat and watched, as Yami muttered obscenities and tried to yank the pendant out again.

"Why don't' you just take it off and pull it through?"

Yami stopped, and looked over at him.

"Why do you care?" he asked back. Jim shrugged, and went back to pulling his sock on.

"Just trying to help…."

Yami snorted. Help, my ass… if he wanted to help, he could go over to his dear old pal and punch his lights out for Yami—he didn't think Mom and Dad would like it very much if he spent the next few days confined to a room somewhere within the depths of the school in ISS, which was what Yami was going to get, if he resorted to violence again.

"Why are you even over here?" Yami suddenly shot at Jim. Jim didn't look up at Yami. In fact, he didn't even move at all. He merely said to the locker,

"Oh, you know… Joey's in one of his moods again. I didn't want to be over there for it."

"Moods?" Yami exclaimed, fighting to keep his voice below the din of the rest of the locker room, "This is just some phase he goes through!"

"Hey—" Jim held up his hand to stop Yami's lowered outburst, "There's a lot more going on than you think."

Yami just rolled his eyes, and slammed the door to his locker shut.

"Look," he said, taking a step towards Jim, who merely looked up at him with a calm expression, "I know there's a lot going on that I don't know about. But when I see one of my friends coming into a classroom looking like he got run over, I don't _need _to know everything!"

"But—"

"I don't care if Joey just came out of a mental hospital! The fact that he's beating _anyone_ to a bloody pulp is not right!"

Jim didn't respond. Yami left it at that, tucked his shoelaces into the sides of his tennis shoes, and was about to joint the mass of guys heading into the gym when he heard Jim's voice behind him say,

"So it's not just because it's Yugi that you're mad?"

"No," Yami replied, in a calmer tone. "I just despise people who think they can take advantage of someone smaller than them. Call me stupid, if you want; I've already heard it before."

"And that's why you got into a fight?"

Yami nodded slowly.

"That, and he was pissing me off. _ Anyone _does that, and they get it."

…Jim didn't answer to that.

* * *

They were running around the track that day; something about a mile run, or something. Yami wasn't listening. He just got the part where you're supposed to run four times around the track, and then memorize the time they gave you as you went in. Simple and mindless—a task Yami took on quite gladly. 

If he was paying attention to his surroundings, he would have easily seen and heard Joey and Honda talking about him. Although put more accurately, Joey was ranting, Honda was actively listening, and Jim hung back just a step, lost in his own world of thought.

"Well, Yami's kinda weahd in his own way, too," Joey was saying to Honda, as they walked around the track, "lookit when we didn't tell him about the willow! He took that _way_ too seriously…"

"Maybe they're like, related or something. Maybe that's why they get along," Honda said, looking over at the one-sided willow.

"Nah," Joey said, watching Yami run around the other side of the track, "they don't _look _related… the little Midget can't even throw a punch. Yami looks like he could take somebody out."

"He _did_ take you out this morning," Honda laughed.

"Shyaddup!" Joey said, shoving Honda. "How d'ya know about that, anyway?"

"Everyone knows," Honda said, walking to Joey's side again. Joey groaned loudly.

"_Shit_…" he said.

Honda didn't say anything.

Jim looked from one to the other, in the sudden silence that followed. He was walking behind Joey and Honda, just far away enough so that he could walk comfortably, but he could still hear what was going on. "Damn punk," Joey muttered. Jim noticed he was watching Yami's progress around the track. "What does he think he's doin', defendin' that little twerp? Does he think it makes him look good, or somethin'?"

"Maybe Yami just likes to judge people on his own."

Honda and Joey looked over at Jim. He was squinting thoughtfully at the tree.

"What does that mean?" Honda asked. Jim blinked, and turned to his friends.

"He's the only one that's actually made friends with Yugi, you realize."

"Nah, theah was that othah kid…remembah, Honda? Short, glasses, kinda mousey-lookin?"

"Oh, yeah… didn't we beat him up a couple times?"

"I thought the football team took care of him," Jim said.

"That was befoah you, Jim."

"That's what you guys told me," Jim said.

"…Oh."

"You know, I think it was Lance that did most of that…" Honda said. "We just picked on Yugi."

"huh…." Joey said. "Maybe."

Jim shook his head in an attempt to clear it, a little.

"Dude… don't' you think we sound kind of morbid? Seriously!" he added; Joey was giving him a strange look.

"Think about it—we're beating up people for fun. Doesn't that seem a little weird?" Jim asked.

"Ah, shut it already!" Joey said, with a wave of his hand, "You're startin' ta sound like Yami."

"Maybe—" Jim started.

"What?" Joey urged, rounding on Jim, "Maybe what?"

"It just makes more sense," Jim finished, walking ahead.

Honda started after him.

"Wait—" he said, "You're saying that _Yami_ makes more sense than _us_?"

Jim paused for a moment, thoughtful.

"Yeah," he said after a while. "I think I am."

Joey took a step towards Jim.

"Is that what I think it is?"

"Hey, hey hey," Honda said, stepping between them.

"A threat?" Joey continued, ignoring Honda.

"Dude—" Honda started to say.

"Then why don't ya go an' join the freak show ovah theah! Hah? Ya wanna? You too good fa us now, is that it?"

"Joey!" Honda shouted—but Joey was beyond his reach, even though he was trying his best to hold him back.

"Get aff!"

Jim stood just out of Joey's reach, wary of Joey's movements and how Honda's grip wasn't as tight as he would have liked it to have been.

"I'm just saying, man!" Jim said, not entirely sure Joey heard him. "It just seems weird!"

"Go an! Get outta heah if we're too violent for ya, ya wimp! Ya wanna be like Yugi, hah? Leggo a' me, Honda—"

"Joey!" Coach snapped, walking over to where the three of them had stopped a while ago.

"What!" Joey snapped back, turning to Coach. Coach merely stared down at him, imposing glare apparrent.

"Watch what you do, Wheeler," Coach warned, before walking away again. As soon as Coach was out of earshot, Honda let go of Joey, who stumbled forwards. When he straightened again, he was face to face with Jim. Joey's eyes narrowed to a glare, and he growled,

"Whose side are you an, anyway?"

Jim didn't answer that. He just looked very confused.

* * *

Yami was back in the locker rooms before anyone else; it was only when people started coming in that he heard about Joey's almost fight. He didn't need or want to hear about anything else; he'd just get mad again, he knew. 

Jim didn't say anything, either, as he changed back into his clothes. They both kept silent, and parted their ways with nothing more than a quick glance, eyes only meeting as they scanned the hallway idly for where they could make their way through the crowd.

Up in Frau's room, though, Anzu noticed something wrong right away. Yami at first didn't want to talk about it, but it came out in the end. Everything from the fight that morning (which Anzu had heard about) to what he had heard happening in gym. He found it hard to keep his voice down again as he ranted, even though the din of the classroom was quite loud. He told her about Jim's questioning, and what he told Jim in response.

"You know, _this _is what I'm talking about!" Yami said, "I stand up for my friend against a bastard of a bully, and everyone is gawking at me like I'm a feak!" Yami sighed angrily. "Does it make any sense to you?"

Anzu nodded, head resting on a bandaged hand.

"_I_ think it does," she replied. Yami stared at her in disbelief.

"…how" he asked.

"Joey, Jim, Honda, and Yugi have all been in the same classes since middle school. And Joey and Yugi went to the same elementary school. As far as I can tell, this has been the way of things since… forever."

Yami shook his head, copying down yet another rendition of Nominative Norman and Accusative Axel from the overhead.

"I still don't get it," he said, "I mean, I figured it had been going on a while, but wouldn't someone notice and get fed up with it? You just summed up most of Yugi's and Joey's life."

He looked up, and saw out of the corner of his eye Anzu giving him a look. He turned to her.

"What?"

"Not everyone likes to take action like you do."

Yami blinked.

"…What do you mean?"

"People will know something's right, but they won't do it because the wrong way is easier, or more fun. And you don't do that."

Just hearing that comment caused Yami to suddenly think of an incident he hadn't thought of in a very long time; those same words had been said, in their own way, by someone else he knew…

The person had been a guy, before, but other than that, it was pretty much the same thing.

Huh.

"Oh," was all he said in reply. Anzu probably didn't hear it; she was trying to correct grammatical error of a sentence in German. After a while, Anzu suddenly said,

"I think you're right about Yugi. I think he's hiding a lot of things."

Yami nodded, then admitted, "And the stupid thing is… I want to know what it is." He then rolled his eyes. "I want to know what everything is, though, so that's just me."

"Well.. he has to tell someone sometime. It doesn't have to be you—to be honest, I have a feeling it won't be, don't ask me why—but he'll open up to someone. It's just a matter of when he finds the right person."

"Ah," Yami replied. "One of those keep-things-in-'till-you-explode type things?"

"I think so," Anzu smiled. "Until then… just be his friend."

"Yeah," Yami laughed, "And _only_ his friend."

"I wouldn't think he would be your type, anyway," Anzu replied, looking Yami up and down.

"Oh?" Yami asked, "And what is my 'type'?"

"I don't know," Anzu said, looking Yami over. "Probably someone who's…taller."

Yami just looked at Anzu for a moment, then shook his head.

"…I'm not going to ask."

* * *

IMPORTANT AUTHOR NOTE: **Anzu is just as much of a character as any of the other Yu-Gi-Oh characters. Please get it through your heads that she is Yami's friend in this fic, and that I don't' want to hear any more complaints about how much you hate her. If that's all you have to say, PLEASE don't bother writing a review. **

Seriously, I'm getting sick of it. I haven't gotten many comments, but I've gotten enough.

Okay, Trem's officially weird. While writing the almost-fight scene in this chapter, I was listening to Mandy Moore's "Saturate me". And that just equals implications I'd rather not think about….

Joey: Oh, Jim! Saturate me!  
Trem: Oh, god, no!

…yeah.

In other news; here are my review responses…

**Crimson Eyed Dragon: **Why, thank you! I just find it hard to make him girly; you can't hide the fact that he's a man, after all… even if he is gay. He'll be a little harder to seduce than all those girly Yamis out there, bwahaha…

**Cutehelehjames: **(runs to computer and starts typing) glad you like!

**Hikari Skysong:** Yeah, ISS isn't the best thing in the world. That's why Yami didn't get it, hehe. And Yugi's life will change, don't worry. I'm not going to have him be a tortured soul until the end of his days…that'd be just too mean and angsty for Trem.

**hAdOwCat: **I'm right there with you; Joey had every one of those punches coming. Karma just isn't nice to him today…and I try to update asap; I'm one of those people that's bugged by the fact that it's not finished, so I'm not going to run off and leave this anytime soon. (Besides—the JoeyKarma needs to take full effect next chapter!)

**Pharaoh Atemu's Angel:** Thanks!

**R.Wolfsbane:** I like your poem; I'm so happy that I inspired it! _(fuzzies!)_

**DarkMagicianGirlDragonKnight: **(sigh….) so much hate….(puts on hippie outfit) learn to love, man! It's good you liked the rest of it, though.


	15. Detention

…I'm going to wear off the lettering on my keyboard, soon. The bottom row's already starting to come off—it looks like I have two v's, instead of a 'v' and an 'n', and I have half an 'm', now... Ah, well—it's kind of old, anyways…

…not that you guys needed to know that. But I said it anyway.

And sorry for the horrid delay, and I'll be honest with you; the last three weeks of your senior year of high school are hectic, expensive, and BUSY! I'm surprised I'm sitting here doing this instead of the mounds of stuff that I need to be doing, but my nagging at how long it's been since I last updated has nagged me long enough; and so you get an update. I assume my gremlins are working on the math homework now—assuming that they know about how to identify ellipses… pro'lly should have asked them if they could before assigning them my homework.

But anyway.

Fly away, chapter 15!

Chapter title: Detention

* * *

For the rest of the day, Yugi tried to fight off that lurking feeling. It didn't fade with time, which just unnerved him even more; it was a development he was not expecting, nor wanting. In fact, as the day progressed, the feeling became lager; it gathered more pressure, and made itself more apparent in Yugi's mind.

By the time the bell dismissing school rang, Yugi practically ran out of his classroom. He didn't think he could stay collected much longer. Now, he really felt like he was going to explode.

But with what, he didn't know. This had never happened before; he'd always managed to calm himself, to force himself to forget it…why wasn't it working now?

He had agreed to help Mr. Lawrence, the genetics teacher, with the moving of some things from the supply room to his room, after school; Grandpa wasn't going to be missing him anytime soon, and business had been kind of slow in the shop lately anyway, so Yugi figured he could afford to stay for a few minutes to help Mr. Lawrence out. It didn't take long, either; turned out there wasn't much to move.

And when they were done, Yugi hauled his backpack onto his back, letting loose a hiss of pain, as the straps dug into a bruise he didn't know he had before, on his shoulder. Mr. Lawrence had given him a funny look, but Yugi just kept silent.

Any other time, he would have told Mr. Lawrence a story to keep him from prying—a lie about falling on his shoulder from his bed, or something—but right then, he couldn't think of much else besides getting out of the school and back home. He had that urge to either tear something apart, or curl up in a ball again until it went away.

Yugi stopped in the middle of the hallway, suddenly, drawn out of this thoughts by a rush of cold air. He looked around.

There were no doors nearby…there weren't any hallways, either, branching off of this one. He felt another wave of icy air wash over him, and he looked forward again, hoping to see a window left open, or some other such innocuous thing….

But what his eyes met was hardly innocuous.

Yugi blinked again, just to make sure…

It was.

A ghostly, translucent figure, dressed in white cloth and much jewelry, stuttered into focus before him.

Yugi took a step back, and shook his head. He _couldn't_ be here! It was daylight! He was at school!

And what was even more strange was how the figure smiled at him; just a small, gentle smile…nothing more. If it hadn't been from a ghost Yugi was seeing in the middle of Domino High School's hallway, it would have been somewhat comforting. But instead, the figure was an eerie bluish-white color, just as it had the last time Yugi saw him. And, reflecting on this fact, Yugi did what any other person would have done.

He ran.

He sprinted down the hallway, ignoring his sides' pleas to slow down. He was almost out of the school when a thought popped into his mind, causing him to skid to a halt just before the double-doors to freedom.

He had forgotten his history textbook. An image of it, sitting in the rack underneath his desk chair, struck fear into Yugi's mind. He could just see some jerk taking it and throwing it away, just so he would have to pay for it at the end of the semester and suffer without one in the meantime.

"Crap!" Yugi hissed, whirling around and stalking down the hallway again. A few moments after—

"Agh!" He clutched his left side, squeezing the muscle that had decided to act up again. Not that it helped physically, but knowing where it came from somehow seemed to calm Yugi down. As much as he could right now, anyway…taking a deep breath, he straightened again, and continued when the pain had subsided enough—though he went a little more slowly, this time.

He didn't even know why he was bothering; Mr. Dither probably wasn't there anymore, and his book had been most likely if not positively stolen the next period. People would just know it was his, he was sure. All his things just gave off a certain vibe that people seemed to catch on to quite quickly; a mystery that Yugi had given up on solving a while ago. Now, he just prepared for it.

When he got to the World History classroom, Yugi was surprised to find that the lights were on. Then he remembered—detention.

Yami and Joey were on the other side of that door, doing whatever Mr. Dither had assigned them to do. Sighing angrily, Yugi rolled his eyes. Just his luck that he had to face Yami and Joey in the same room for a second time that day…

This—this whole horrifying situation Yugi found himself swimming in—was beyond icky, now.

This was downright hell.

Taking a big breath that hurt his sides, he pushed Mr. Dither's door open just enough, and slid inside.

They were silently scrubbing desks. Yugi as slightly surprised; had expected world war three to have been in progress, but… they were silent. It was one of the most tense silences Yugi had ever experienced in his life, but it was one nonetheless. He took a step.

They both looked up, the minute they heard him walk into the room. Joey pretended he hadn't, jerking his head back down and focusing on the rag he was holding. Yami had a very uncharacteristic, apathetic expression. Yugi could tell he was numbing his mind to deal with his being with Joey for however long they needed to be here, and Yugi couldn't blame him; Joey seemed much better than he was when one wasn't thinking around him.

Yugi just crept onward. When he finally reached his desk, he looked apprehensively at the rack underneath.

It was empty.

Yugi slammed his hand down on the desk, and had to keep from shouting out something obscene by biting down on his lower lip. Immediately, both heads snapped up again, this time a little more interested.

"Something wrong?" Yami asked.

Yugi suddenly couldn't see clearly, anymore. He vaguely wondered why, and tried to blink to see straight again.

"No," he managed. Although it was a lot harder to say than it usually was. Yugi felt like he was evicting his tongue from his throat with the utterance, pulling it past any and all other urges boiling under his skin. Yami's next comment didn't help, either.

"Yeah, right," he said.

Thankfully, Joey snorted, shooting a glare at Yami.

"Why don't ya just leave him alone?"

Yami turned his attention to Joey.

"Why don't you? I'm not the one who—"

"You don't even know!" Joey cut off, straightening. "How do know I did that?"

Yami just raised an eyebrow.

"I think I can guess." He said flatly.

"Yeah," Joey replied, "An' I'm just the big bad guy everybody assumes did it! Is that what it is?"

"Yes," Yami said, "that's exactly what it is."

"Well what if I didn't this time, hah?"

"That's not really an issue, is it?"

"Yes it is! You just blamin' me for something I maybe didn't do?"

"Are you so cowardly, Joey, you can't face up to your own stunts?"

"You callin' me a liar?"

"No, I'm calling you a coward. There's a difference!"

"Man, if we weren't in detention right now, I'd beat your ass right now!"

"You want a repeat of this morning? Be my guest," Yami retorted. "You're still a dick for it."

"You little—!"

Yugi stopped listening. The voices elevated in level, the insults started flying with more speed, faces got redder…and Yugi turned around. He didn't even want to look, anymore.

He didn't know why it was affecting him so badly, either. Normally, he would have just…shut off right now, and maybe have walked out of the room. Instead, he was trying to keep from hyperventilating. And the fact that this had never happened before scared the crap out of him—which did nothing to calm his nerves. Finally, in a disparate attempt not to collapse, or whatever this was leading to, he turned back around and tried to stop this…attack…at its source.

Of course, the result wasn't very effective. Since he was agitated, his voice suddenly dropped ten decibels. Add the knot of fear that seemed to clench his stomach, and Yugi managed nothing more than to stammer out,

"Just—stop, all right?"

It was a given that Yami wasn't listening. And Yugi didn't say anything after that. He would have started listening to Yami and Joey's argument again, to find a pause in their verbal bombardment, but his ears didn't seem to be working anymore. He realized his fists were clenched, too… He took a deep, shuddering breath to try and calm down. Neutrality, he knew, was his best and only weapon. It always had been.

…And if he could force himself to believe that right now, he would. The realization that he couldn't anymore made a part of him cringe in shock, and fear. But another part of him—that lurking horror Yugi refused to believe came from his own mind—forced him to do something he had never done before.

"Will you both SHUT UP!"

In the dead silence that followed, Joey and Yami looked down at Yugi. He was glaring at them both, quaking with rage. Suddenly, he didn't feel quite as suffocated anymore. And that alone, he realized later on reflection, was probably what spurred him on to say what he did, next;

"Just shut up and forget it! _You_," he pointed to Joey, "can stop talking about me anytime now! It's _sickening_ that you haven't felt guilty yet, after all this time! And _you_!" He rounded on Yami. "You think you're helping! You think you're really making things easier? I don't _need_ your help right now! It's not even help! If anything, you've made things _worse_! That was the first time this year I've been beaten up! And I have a feeling that if you weren't around I wouldn't have been!"

The minute the words left his mouth, Joey's eyes widened, and he looked to Yami to see what his reaction was going to be.

Yami didn't say anything. His eyes narrowed, and he slowly brought up his arms to cross them across his chest, drawing himself up as he did so. Yugi found that he really didn't care, at the moment.

"Oh, I'm _really_ scared now!" Yugi said, his tone dripping with sarcasm, "Yami has his arms crossed! Let's all run for the hills!"

Joey turned to Yugi, now, eyes still as wide. He looked more dumb than he usually did—like a goldfish.

"That's _not_ funny," Yami stated quietly.

"I DIDN'T MEAN FOR IT TO BE, YOU DINGBAT!" Yugi yelled back, at the top of his lungs,. "My _god_, you're dense!"

Yami was silent again and he blinked, still keeping his glare. Yugi could tell that hadn't been the reaction he'd been expecting. Then again, Yugi didn't really expect anything to fall out of his mouth, either. Yet here he was, making himself hoarse on injustices he thought he had dealt with long ago.

It was a thought that galled him.

…however, this was a feeling his mouth seemed to overlook.

"At least I'm _doing_ something about it," Yami replied quietly. His voice was so cold, Yugi's insides clenched. Then again, they were clenching at everything right now—especially himself.

"What the frick do you mean!" he retorted. "It's MY problem—"

"And you're letting it sit there!" Yami snapped. The severity and frustration in his tone echoed off the classroom walls, which threw Yugi for a moment, and he paused just long enough for Yami to get his two cents in.

"Let me tell you something," Yami said, in that same booming voice. "If you try to ignore what's going on behind your back, it'll just go on without you! And then when you least expect it, it'll come back to bite you—hard! And it'll hurt like _hell_ because you've let it grow teeth!"

"…So you're saying it's all my fault!" Yugi accused.

"It's your fault for not doing anything about it!"

"So you're just going to come in and fix my problem!" Yugi said, as he felt a wave of hot anger wash over him, "It doesn't worklike that!" He shouted.

Yami looked away. The only thing that could be heard was the wet splat of Joey's rag falling out of his hand, and onto the floor.

"And if you think it does, you've got some serious issues! I don't care how many problems I have! They're my own to deal with! Just _leave me alone_!" Yugi stressed the last sentence, making sure he enunciating clearly so that no one could possibly misunderstand him. "I don't need any more crap going on right now. I have enough as it is without you breathing down my neck, and you beating me up for entertainment," he said, giving a glare to a frozen Joey.

"Both of you just need to go find something else to do. Really. I don't care, and I don't want to care. I just want to be left alone."

He started to walk out of the room but was stopped, again, by Yami's voice.

"You could at least try," He said. Yugi stopped in mid-pace, and turned to see Yami giving him a very strange look; like he was disappointed, almost.

"What do you mean?" He shot, a little more nastily than he had intended. Yami shrugged, still giving him that stare.

"What I said." He replied distantly, voice laden with a cold distance.

The silence following his remark stung at Yugi's ears—or maybe that was because they were ringing so badly. His fists hurt from clenching them so tightly, and he still felt like he was going to suffocate, although a little less so. But he seemed to have his mind back together in one piece. And with that intact, Yugi finally did what he should have done when he first learned that his textbook was gone.

He walked out the door, pained sides forgotten in the rush of shocked feeling that had consumed him.

* * *

Yami watched, as Yugi went out of the room. He was still taken aback by what he had said, and how he had burst out like that, but…given the circumstances, no one was acting normally.

Yami figured he'd probably die of an early heart attack, if things kept going the way they were; he was yelling and stressing out enough. But in his opinion, there were just a lot of things in his life to get stressed out about, and to get mad at.

Like Joey, for instance, who was still gawking at the opened door. Yami cleared his throat. Joey's wide-eyed, utterly stupefied expression was turned to him. Yami gave him a glare, and Joey shrunk back just slightly.

"You say _anything_," Yami said in a dangerous voice, "You die. No rumors, no telling friends, no _nothing_. And I'll know if you have or not."

Joey held up his hands. "I wasn't gonna," he said.

Yami finally picked up his abandoned rag again, and started cleaning the desks, hoping to keep his mind off of what happened. But, about halfway through his third one he heard Joey mutter,

"Bunch a' shit…"

Yami paused, and looked up from what he was doing.

"What?"

"What ya told Yugi, that's what," Joey said, giving Yami a challenging look. Yami simply looked back to his desk. He didn't want to start this now; Mr. Dither might walk in at the wrong time—again.

"…Why is it shit?" Yami asked.

"'cause no one does that kinda stuff. You may fool him, but you're not kiddin' me."

Yami set the rag down on his desk, and folded his arms again. Immediately, he remembered Yugi's comment on the gesture. He let them fall to his sides again.

"And if I'm bullshitting, why would I?"

Joey shrugged, his eyes still on the table. "'cause it sounds better. Everyone wants to sound good. Dunno why you're botherin' around the midget, but that's your problem."

"The only problem I'm finding is yours," Yami stated. "I'm not the one who started the fight."

"I'm nat heah ta talk about this morning!" Joey snapped loudly. Yami could tell it was taking him quite the effort to keep his attention focused on what he was doing.

"I don't even want to be heah."

"Well, neither do I," Yami said. "But the fact remains that we are. Deal."

There was a silence, as they each scrubbed another desk.

"…and why would I want to just spit stuff out to 'look good'? Why wouldn't I just tell him the truth?"

But Joey just shook his head, eyes still on the desk he was cleaning.

"Just drop the act, all right? _I_ don't need ta hear all that. _I_ know it's bullshit."

"You think I'm putting on a show?" Yami retorted, letting his voice raise in volume, "Sorry to disappoint you, but I'm being serious!"

"Yeah, right," Joey sneered. Yami just went back to his work. It wasn't _his_ problem Joey couldn't believe an honest word when he heard one…. After a while, Joey spoke again.

"…Okay, let's pretend for a moment that you're nat fakin' it. Why the hell are you even getting in his business? You like him, or somethin'?"

Yami's fist clenched around the rag. He wished people would quit saying that!

"No, I do not," he stated. "Nor will I. He's enough of a wreck as it is without that whole dimension, and I don't even _want_ to be the one to show him that."

"…Yeah," Joey said flatly. Yami rolled his eyes. Why was he even bothering giving truthful answers to him? He obviously couldn't understand them…

But then Joey said something that for once, made him sound intelligent.

"This isn't the first time you've done this, is it?"

Yami looked over at Joey. He was giving Yami a thoughtful look. Which, on Joey, was startling.

"What do you mean?" Yami asked.

"Gotten into other people's business. Stood up for them. Played the hero."

Yami absentmindedly scrubbed a stubborn stain on someone's desk.

"…if you want to call it that," he said, after a pause.

"Why?" Joey pried. Yami raised an eyebrow at him, surprised he even wanted to know. But Yami voiced an answer, anyway.

"You find things, when you nose into business. Into people, for that matter. Sometimes you find what you expected. Other times, you find a wreck." He shrugged. "And I always want to clean it up, somehow… or make it better, at least."

Joey blinked. His stare was starting to become blank again. Yami rolled his eyes.

"Okay, yeah, I'm stupid," He said, picking up the rag again. "You don't have to tell me."

"…wasn't goin' ta say anything…" Joey replied, turning back to his work.

And the desks, henceforth, were cleaned in silence.

When Mr. Dither came back from the Xerox machine down the hall soon enough, surprised at how much progress the two had made. He dismissed them a tad earlier than they would have been—something that Yami was very thankful for.


	16. The Necklace

A/N: (sigh)…poor Yami. His day is so hellish, right now. First, he gets into a fight with Joey, then he and Yugi argue after school, then he has to threaten Joey within an inch of his life not to tell anyone, ALL during his first detention at Domino, and NOW…he comes home to this.

Sad.

But I get ahead of myself.

Happy reading, everyone.

Chapter title: The Necklace

* * *

Before he knew it, Yami was walking hurriedly down the sidewalk in front of Domino, finally on his way home. He didn't want to think about all that had just happened, but his mind drifted over to the subject anyway, taking with it the perspective of looking back. And what Yami found there, churning inside, was very different from what he had felt just a few minutes ago. Yet, it made sense when he really thought about it. Everything from Yugi's shouting onwards…

It had been an explosion. The words had pierced Yami's and Joey's argument, sending every remnant of concentration on comebacks into the depths of the unknown. They had both turned simultaneously, to behold an entirely new person before them, visibly shaking with the intensity of his emotions.

Yami had been astounded, to put it lightly. He was so utterly shocked he stood still, just as Joey beside him was doing, he knew, because neither of them knew how to even react. And so, Yugi had done it for him. He had turned to Joey, looked him directly in the eye, and told him all that Yami had been shouting at him moments before. He stole a sideways glance at Joey, to see how he was taking it. And to his satisfaction, Joey's eyes were wider than Yami ever remembered seeing them. Did he see guilt, even?

Yami thought about it for a moment, as he automatically made a turn onto the main street. Nah. Guilt was a stretch, when it came to Joey.

Yami's smugness had only lasted for a moment, though. Then, Yugi astounded him again.

He turned to Yami.

'I don't need your help right now,' he had said. And the rage and pain shooting from Yugi's eyes was more than enough to convince Yami that Yugi was iterating what he really felt.

Another feeling, somewhat more serious, washed over Yami. And he realized why he remembered those words;

It hurt.

To know that Yugi was telling him to just leave him alone and forget about it….that hurt.

And then to make that sarcastic comment about Yami's subconscious habit of crossing his arms didn't help. Yami had thrown out some comment—he didn't remember what—that made him look like he was angry. He guessed that the only reason he pulled it off was because the anger was really there; it boiled up promptly after Yugi's embittering accusation. Of course, his cover-up hadn't helped anything; it had just encouraged Yugi to yell even louder.

And so, Yami had decided that, if Yugi wasn't going to accept his help anymore, than he needed to say what he'd been wanting to say for a while, now, while Yugi was still in the room. For all he knew, Yugi would never speak to him again, after this. It had all fallen against him in a matter of moments, yes. But Yami wasn't going to let whatever friendship they had had fall to pieces just yet.

'At least I'm doing something about it,' he had said. Not the best way to start the 'last words' out, so to speak, but it was something. And Yami just went from there, not really paying attention to whatever excuses Yugi was throwing at him. Once he started, he found, he hadn't really cared what anyone else had thought. All he cared about was getting it all out before it was too late.

But then, Yugi had said something else that struck an even deeper nerve within Yami.

'_So you're just going to come in and fix my problem? It doesn't work like that!'_

He'd heard that before. He'd heard it twice. And neither of those times were good memories.

Looks like he'd done it again.

Whatever Yugi had said next just washed over Yami; he wasn't listening, and he didn't think it really mattered, anyway. Joey was staring at him. Idiot.

And Yugi was suddenly walking out. Yami spit out the one thing Yugi should know, and left him with that. He didn't want to explain it again, even though Yugi asked him to. He just didn't. He was done. So Yugi had left.

Although now, Yami wasn't sure if that was the right thing to do. Had he actually listened? Or had he just blown Yami off and stormed out to forget about it? Yami shook his head. There was no way he could ever tell that. He'd just have to see what things were like, later. For now…Yami would just have to hope for the best, and prepare for the worst.

He was good at that kind of thing.

He was somewhat glad, though, that Yugi had finally said something. He knew Yugi held a lot in—but how much, Yami had never known. Today, he had gotten a taste of it.

And a very bitter taste it was. The rage and pain in Yugi's voice had been so intense, every sound shaking with such fervent emotion.

Joey didn't help, either. He hadn't been expecting Joey to help, though, so this came as no surprise. Thinking that his talking bullshit to Yugi came as no surprise, either. Although it was a little strange; one would think Joey had never heard that kind of thing before.

Ah, well. The guy was a jerk, anyway. There was no use trying to spend time thinking over what Joey did.

In all, Yami was glad when he arrived on his street, and saw his house in the distance. Right now, all he wanted to do was to go to sleep. Maybe read, or something. Or just…do nothing. That would be perfectly fine with him.

When Yami (after several tries ) finally wrenched the front door open, he was surprised at how quiet the house was. Since Granmma and Granddad were still there, things were usually pretty noisy. A silent house was never a good sign. Yami let himself fall onto the front door to get it shut again.

Wait—now that he listened, there _were_ people talking in the house …but the intonations of their voices was different than usual…as though they didn't want anyone to overhear them. Yami stood where he was for a moment, contemplating on whether he should just go upstairs, barge into the kitchen under the pretense that he was hungry (which he kind of was, now that he thought about it), or sneak down the front hall and listen to what they were saying before carrying out with the barging in plan.

It didn't take him long to figure out; a few nanoseconds at best.

As noiselessly as he was capable of (which wasn't very, but he managed to preserve their perceived atmosphere of secrecy), he took his backpack off and crept down the front hall, avoiding what hardwood floorboards he knew were noisy.

When he got to a spot where he could hear clearly, but not see anything, he leaned against the wall—in case someone was sitting at the seat where one could easily see down the hallway from. He waited a few moments…so far, no one had said anything.

"I say we should take him out of school," he heard Granmma stating.

Yami was definitely glad he chose to listen before he leapt; they were obviously talking about him. He pressed himself closer to the wall, and shifted his foot away from the nearest squeaky floorboard.

"He's in the district, he's in Domino's draw, and we live fifteen minutes away. That's the school he goes to." Dad said firmly.

"That whole family is dangerous!" Granmma hissed, her Egyptian accent thickening. She got like that when she was agitated, or upset. "For thousands of years, they've been after us! What makes you think that this man, whose father upheld the worst biases towards us, is going to be any different?"

"He hasn't done anything," Mom's voice said. "He said he was going to almost three years ago, but he's never acted on it. And if he were to start threatening again, Yami would tell us."

Yami's eyes narrowed. They were walking about Kaiba again…but why, suddenly, was Gramma pushing for his school transfer now? Or had she been bugging Mom and Dad about this all along behind Yami's back? That'd seem like her…

"So?" Gramma replied, "That doesn't make a difference. He will try to do something. They all have."

"Look, Mother," Dad said. "I'm not going to spend money sending him to a private high school just because of a threat Kaiba made almost three years ago. If he hasn't followed through on it yet, it's likely that he won't."

"He may as well have done it!" Gramma interrupted, her voice rising.

"Sssh!" Dad hushed.

Gramma continued, in a lowered voice—though it still was just as severe.

"It's a miracle that Yami is still alive! No one from that family makes a threat like that and lets it go! I think you're being _very _careless, Amir. I understand that Yami's changed schools once already, but really! It's not safe, keeping them in the same school. If I could trust Yami to tell the truth I would agree with you. But as it is, he's…different." Gramma finished.

It took a moment for Yami to register what his own Grandmother was saying. There was a scraping of a chair.

"This isn't an issue of trust!" Mom snapped, "My son would not lie to us!"

Yami felt his lips curl up in an appreciative smile. Go Mom.

"He can't!" She continued, "You saw him at the dinner table the first day you were here! Remember that? You've seen him! He wears his emotions on his sleeve! He always has!"

Yami felt the smile dwindle slightly. She was probably right, but still…it made him sound kind of wishy-washy.

"Besides—he knows what would be coming to him, if we did find out he _had_ lied about that." Dad said.

There was that, too, Yami agreed silently. Dad could get scary, when he was mad. So could Mom, actually…he'd get it from both sides, if they found out he had lied about something like that…

"He still had an affair, didn't he?" Gramma pointed out quietly.

There was a silence. Yami suddenly felt his eyes narrow, and that age-old anger start to well up in his stomach. _How _many times had they been through this? And Gramma was _sill _harping on about it! It was three years ago, for christ's sake!

"It wasn't an affair," Mom said quietly.

Exactly! At least _someone_ believed him….

"He felt sorry for Kaiba. Yami just wanted to help."

Gramma sniffed.

"From what I heard, it went farther than that."

Yami felt his fists clench.

"Yami told us it didn't." Dad said. "And we believe him."

_They'd better!_

Yami stood there for a few more moments, silently fuming. Nothing else was said, and for that Yami was grateful. He didn't think he could handle hearing any more of Gramma's obvious doubt of him.

It was times like this he really didn't like his extended family. Well—he got along with Granddad just fine. Even when there wasn't anyone to translate for him, Yami and Granddad could communicate through hand gestures and acting out, which always entertained Yami to no end. Granddad seemed to enjoy it too—it was like their own little language. But everyone else…ugh.

Yami heard Mom sigh.

"I'd better go see how Yami's doing," she said.

Yami took this as his cue to start heading up the stairs. He didn't know how he made it to the front door to where his backpack was, but he had just picked it up when Mom poked her head out the door.

"Yami?"

"Huh?" Yami tried to sound as innocently unaware of the kitchen conversation as possible.

…and judging by the look he was getting from Mom, she wasn't buying it.

Crap.

"…I was just getting my backpack," Yami tried to say convincingly. Mom just looked at him for a long moment.

"I didn't hear you go up the stairs. Or back down. Usually you're pretty loud."

Yami shrugged in what he hoped was a casual way. "It was quiet down here. I thought Dad was making a call, or something."

Another long stare. Yami hated it when she did that; she knew he wasn't good at putting on the 'I didn't do anything' face for a long time—she _knew_ it, and she was going to worm it out of him. She sighed, and crossed her arms.

"You didn't go upstairs," she stated again. Yami let out his held breath, and looked down.

"No," he confessed.

"Yami?" he heard Dad call from the kitchen.

"Yeah?"

"Come here for a minute."

Double Crap.

"Right," Yami replied, setting his backpack down again in the same spot. He walked down the front hallway and into the kitchen, Mom in front of him. She sat back down in the only chair pulled out, and folded her hands together Yami just remained in the doorway, hands shoved in his back pockets.

Whatever Dad had to say, it wasn't going to be good. He cleared his throat, and leaned over onto the table on his elbows.

"First of all," he began, his tone very serious, "Why are you late?"

"Practice," Yami replied. He knew they didn't believe him, but he really didn't want them flipping out at him right now about detention….

"Practice, which got out an hour ago. It takes you fifteen minutes to get home." Mom said. "At least, that's what you've told me."

Yami shrugged, avoiding both his parents' gaze.

"I was talking to people."

"Hm." Gramma cleared her throat. Yami looked over at her.

"I wasn't doing what you think I was, _grandmother_," he snapped.

"Hey!" Dad snapped right back at him, "You don't take that tone with her!"

"I heard—!"

"You want to get grounded?"

Silence. Glare met glare.

Mom shifted in her chair, leaning forward just like Dad.

"We know what you heard, Yami," she said. Everyone turned to her. "But you didn't hear everything."

"Yeah," Yami shot back, "I missed the part where Gramma praises me up and down. Right."

"Yami!" Dad snapped again.

"_What?_ I know what I heard, all right?"

"You don't talk that way to your grandmother!"

"SO! I don't give a flip! She still thinks I'm screwing Kaiba in the bushes when _you know_ its' not true! HOW many times do I have to TELL you! His father and brother died on the same night in a car crash! All he had was an uncle that didn't listen to him! I didn't even know he was part of that family until you guys said something about it! And it was WAY after that when he threatened me!"

He took a breath to steady himself, and glared at them all.

"Sorry if feeling bad for someone isn't what I'm supposed to do. Is that in the ancient scripts, too?"

Gramma suddenly said something in Egyptian to Dad. He said something back, his speech a lot more hesitant and broken; normally, he just responded in English. There was only one time when Dad attempted to speak back to her in Egyptian—and that's when they were trying to block Yami out. He was the only one in that room that didn't understand any Egyptian, and they all knew it.

Yami just rolled his eyes.

"Fine, I'm leaving!" he said, and turned out the door. "You could have just told me!"

He walked out into the living room. He didn't think he could sit still, though, and ended up pacing back and forth, trying not to listen to the conversation blaring from the kitchen. It didn't work. Letting out an angered growl, he pushed the back door open, and shut it quietly behind him.

Things were much more peaceful on the back porch; he could actually hear himself think. The world around him was slowly darkening, drifting between the light of day, and the complete darkness of night. It was quite peaceful.

Yami closed his eyes for a moment, and tried to calm his agitated nerves. He knew he shouldn't have snapped at Gramma like that; Dad was right. She was an elder, and elder people shouldn't be yelled at.

But Yami had been saying the same things since he befriended Kaiba, at Dalton. He seriously had just felt sorry for him; Kaiba looked like a living hell, he had no friends, he was new, just like Yami and all the other freshman were…it just made sense, to Yami, to befriend a classmate.

Not that Kaiba had appreciated it all that much.

"Bastard," Yami muttered, leaning onto the railing, staring down into the small lawn below. "Couldn't have just left…you _had _to end with a bang, didn't you? Had to bring the curse into it…"

Yami pulled the necklace out from under his shirt. It dangled in the air, catching the glow of the house lights behind him.

"But, that's how you guys are; mean and spiteful. Must be a family thing. I didn't even know your family knew _how_ to unleash it," he said. He then shook his head. "Bastard," he muttered again, holding his palm flat and tilting it slightly, watching as the necklace rolled slowly down his hand.

He'd spent countless hours doing this—just staring at it as it rolled, watching how it fell. He knew the pyramid's intricate surface better than anything. He knew that there were tiny hieroglyphs surrounding the eye, and that you needed a magnifying glass to see them. He found that you could get a small bead very stuck inside the eye socket, and that it was almost impossible to get out again.

Yami remembered how he and Dad had spent almost an entire day grappling with the tweezers, trying to wrench that bead out. They had settled down in the middle of the carpet in the living room, Yami watching as Dad worked. It had been funny at first. But things had started to get boring after a while.

And things turned downright scary that evening, because Dad never did get the bead out. The necklace had grown impatient with him, and threw the bead out itself. Yami remembered how frightening it was, seeing Dad falling across the room like that.

It was only at the hospital when Yami found out that he had been jolted by an electric shock. Thankfully, it had caused minimal damage.

Still, the thing that had baffled Yami was that he hadn't felt anything, even though he should have. He had learned in school that metal conducts electricity. Why didn't he get shocked, too?

That's when he had realized the true power behind that little eye—and how little control he had over it. It was a realization that had given him nightmares for years afterwards. And to that day, whenever Dad rolled up his sleeves, Yami felt a pang of guilt. He knew that scar on his wrist wasn't his fault—he didn't ask for the necklace, and he didn't ask for it to lash out at his own father. But he was the one who so stupidly shoved that bead in there in the first place.

Now, that same eye stared out at the world, seemingly innocuous.

It was amazing how so much pain and fear could be blamed on a single consequence, brought on by a single decision a single person made so many millennia ago. Yami knew the story that started it all very well; after all, it was his ancestor that had decided to take the curse on himself, instead of letting the demon it originated from live for three days to eat whatever it pleased, before dissipating into nothing.

Yami often wondered what he would have done, in that same position. And the conclusion came quickly, every single time;

He'd have done the opposite. Three days, and it would have been over. Instead…he had _this_.

Yami felt his hands tighten on the railing of the porch. It was all so brutally unfair, at times…

He heard the door behind him open. Yami turned around to find Mom standing there, giving him a small smile.

"I thought I'd find you here," she said. Yami just nodded, and looked down.

"Your Dad wants to have a word with you."

Yami nodded again, letting the necklace fall off his hand.

"Alright." And he walked inside again, wondering just what Dad had to say. It probably wasn't good... nothing today had been good.

Sure enough, Dad was standing in the living room, looking very serious—just like he had been in the kitchen, a while ago. Taking a breath, he said,

"I wanted to talk to you about the necklace, Yami."

…great. Yami scanned the carpet.

"You know your grandmother was just worried about you."

"Yeah," Yami replied flatly, still staring off to the side, "You always don't trust people when you're worried about them. Makes _perfect_ sense…"

"That's another thing I want to talk to you about," Dad stated. Yami just rolled his eyes—whenever it came to Gramma's flaws, Dad always avoided the subject, as if he couldn't bear to admit she was completely bitchy, at times. And that'd be too harsh of a word for her wrinkled ears, Yami was sure—

"I want to talk about your…preferences," Dad said. Yami threw a glare at him.

"Just say I'm a fag, for christ's sake."

Dad sighed at Yami's language. "You shouldn't use that word—"

"I can call myself whatever I damn well want!" Yami shot back, cutting him off. "Are you going to tell me I can't? Is that what your little 'talk' is about?"

"No, it's not!" Dad snapped, his voice rising, "And if you keep this up, you'll be hearing what I have to say when you're grounded!"

Yami crossed his arms, narrowed his glare, and kept silent. He _really _wasn't in the mood to 'talk'.

Dad took another deep breath, and started again.

"You come from a long line of Egyptian people," he said.

Ah, great, Yami thought, _this_ talk…

"And they all have suffered the same way as you and I—ever since the priest of the pharaoh cursed his leader out of spite, over four thousand years ago."

"'Cursed be the tomb that he bears for all eternity, lest the evils within are unleashed. Then all his people shall perish'." Yami iterated. "What's your point?" he asked, even though he knew what was coming.

"You know the rest of that passage, too." Dad stated. He was referring to the ancient papyrus script that had been preserved as best as the Atemuryokan family line had been able to, over the millennia. It was all translated and copied down onto various pieces of paper to keep the specifics of the curse alive, and this is what Yami had learned about the necklace from. But the original still existed, lurking somewhere in the family's archives.

Yami nodded.

"Including the bit about passing it on," Dad continued.

Yami nodded again. He could just hear what was coming next...

"Yami…" Dad said, "I don't want you to throw your life away, over this. You have great potential. You're a good student, you're a good athlete, and you're very determined to get what you want. I just want to see you… live your life happily."

Yep. Yami was right…

"That's what you've been saying for the past seven years," he stated.

"And I mean it," Dad replied.

But Yami shook his head.

"…You think I don't mean it?" Dad asked.

"No," Yami said, "I don't believe it."

"…Why not?"

"You _know_ why," Yami replied, looking to Dad again, "Any way I cut it, I'm going to end up screwed over in the end!"

"…Not necessarily—" Dad tried to say, but Yami just cut him off.

"Okay, let's face it—I've got two options! One," he held up a finger, "Is that I marry some girl I don't love because I'm gay, and force this thing onto my firstborn kid when they're ten. Let's not forget how babies come into the world in the first place! Option Two," he held up another finer, "Is that I wait until some evil demon thing that's been growing in another dimension for thousands of years is unleashed on the world and eats everyone, killing me in the process!"

Dad ran a hand across the back of his neck.

"I personally think it's pretty clear which one to choose," he said. Yami snorted.

"You're straight."

"Well, what am I supposed to do, Yami?" Dad snapped. "There's nothing I can do! There's nothing _any_ of us can do! And I'm sorry that I have to be so strict about this, but I don't want thousands of people's lives over my head! And I don't think you want it, either."

Yami sighed angrily, and gave him the answer he wished he wasn't so concerned about.

"No," he said, "I don't."

"Good," Dad said.

Yami pulled the necklace out from under his shirt, and stared at the eye.

"So I'll just ruin my own life for a bunch of people I don't know," he stated.

Out of the corner of his eye, Yami could see Dad run his fingers through his hair. When he spoke, he sounded extremely tired, all the sudden.

"You're not going to ruin your life, Yami," he said. Yami clenched the necklace in his fist.

"I don't know what you call lying to someone you don't love and forcing yourself on her to get a kid is, then," he said, his tone extremely sarcastic.

"Yami—"

"What?" Yami snapped.

"I wish I could tell you something else, believe me!" Dad said earnestly. "I wish I could just tell you to take it off and melt it down to nothing. But—"

"But it's _sick_!" Yami exclaimed, throwing the necklace down again. "Can't you see how _sick _this is?"

"It's either that or the alternative!"

"I can't!" Yami insisted, "That wouldn't be fair to her!" He didn't know, exactly, who 'she' was, but it didn't really matter. He watched, as Dad's eyes darkened even more in anger.

"Yes you can," he said in clipped tones, getting up from the arm of the couch, "And you _will_."

"This isn't something I can just switch off!" Yami yelled back.

"Neither is that necklace, Yami!" Dad shouted back, his voice taking on that booming quality Yami himself used not that long ago, with Yugi. "You _can_ force yourself to change! You _can't _force that necklace to! You're only taking your own life if you refuse to do this, and that is NOT something I'm going to let you do!"

"When you put it that way, you make it sound like I'm going to commit suicide!" Yami shouted.

"WELL THAT'S WHAT YOU _ARE_ DOING!" Dad bellowed.

His words rung in the silent air like the death knell they promised, sending Yami's whole body into shock. Dad's angered face slackened, when he saw Yami's shocked state—then it turned to desperation.

"Yami—" Dad's voice was suddenly strangled. Yami just took a step back, shaking his head.

"Yami," Dad said again, "Please—"

But Yami was already walking out of the room. He wiped his eyes; they were starting to water. He didn't know if it was from frustration or fright—his insides were churning with both. All of Dad's words seemed to have paralyzed his mind suddenly, and they were reverberating through his head again, and again…

"Dammit," he choked out, as he tried to calm himself in the hallway. But with every second, Yami knew he was fighting a losing battle. There was nothing else for it.

He ran up the stairs.

He slammed his bedroom door shut more loudly than he intended, and saw the shock joggle the loose items in his room, slightly. He leaned against the door, taking deep breaths. His head was reeling, and his eyes just wouldn't stop tearing up.

_Why_ had he said that? Yami wanted to be able to just pass the necklace on, just like Dad said…

But Yami _knew_ that he couldn't. Mom was right—he was horrible at lying, and something that huge was just out of the question. He didn't know who _could_ fake love—or anything close to it…Yami couldn't even pretend to like someone he despised. And marrying a woman just to pass on a piece of gold was ridiculous.

He had meant what he said down there, more than the panic that was washing over him now was urging him to take it back. Every word he'd meant to say…and he had a feeling that Dad meant what he had said, too. And that realization frightened him more than ever.

He picked up the necklace again. The little eye stared back—cold, black, unfeeling. He threw it down, somehow hoping that it would just fly out the window across the room, and he wouldn't have to think about it ever again. But, as always, he felt that familiar tug around his neck as it settled back onto the middle of his chest.

"Dammit," he swore again, as large, full tears started to roll down his cheeks. He let himself slide down his door onto the floor, hiding his face in his hands as he went.

"Shit…"

* * *

A/N: …and you know you've gotten the point across when you're reading it the last time before you post, and you're feeling for the character. Man…I'm getting into this story more than I thought I would.

SO—now you know about the curse. I've been waiting since November last year to post this part of the story, and now I have. Sixteen chapters of writing, and I finally get to what my original idea was. Now things are _really_ going to start rolling …

But for now, I must reply to you guys. I mean, come on—you're always asking these questions; how can I not answer them? Then again, even those of you who didn't ask anything get a babbling of some sort…just because I'm that talkative, when given a keyboard (maybe THIS is why I can't see my bottom row of letters anymore…I'm a motorhand!)

You know…motor mouth…typing…hands…motor hand…

Ahem.

Yeah, I'm a little weird. Bad puns are a language I speak fluently in.


	17. Joey

A/N: aargh…that song by Depeche Mode called "Enjoy the Silence" was running through my head while writing this chapter…'twas very annoying, even though I'm writing about silence. Kind of funny, that correlation.

Anyway…this is a very big author's note, for me.

I am graduating from High School TODAY. THIS EVENING.

Too old to be writing in this genre of fan fiction? Yes.

Do I care? Eh…

But the bottom line is this;

GOODBYE, CLASS OF 2005! WOO HOO! WE MADE IT!

(ahem).

I'm done now.

Here's your chapter.

Chapter title: Joey

* * *

The clock's large white face positively gleamed against the wall of dull browns and grays it hung on, a beacon of both hope and sorrow for all those who laid eyes on it. Slowly it ticked, never stopping, never quickening; always the same painfully steady rhythm, grating on the restless ear while almost inaudible to the patient one. There is a reason why such calm is considered a virtue.

…and a trait that seemed to skitter away in the other direction, whenever Joey tried to utilize it. He grit his teeth at the annoyance that constant ticking brought him, magnified in a stifled silence only fitting for a library, or any other such dull, deadened place.

Like the ISS room.

Joey stretched in his seat, and looked at the clock. It was only nine in the morning—about two minutes since he last looked. He put his hands over his face, and let out a groan of frustration. This was going to take _forever_…

Reluctantly, his eyes settled once again on the stack of work his teachers had thrown together for him that morning. It remained as it had been when he had first shuffled groggily into the room an hour ago, sitting down at his desk without a word.

The supervisor didn't even bother telling him the rules; he had seen Joey enough times before to remember his face, if not his habit of looking at the clock whenever it ticked. He just wrote Joey's name down on a slip of paper to prove he was there, and went back to his ominous paper shifting on the desk. After that, he had started to read a small paperback book, which sprung up whenever he lifted his hand off it to turn the page.

Joey had figured he read about three pages a minute. Whether that was fast or slow, he didn't know; but that's how often he heard the book springing shut again, the binding smacking loudly against the hard top of the desk. And those few seconds in between each struggle…silence.

Joey hated silence. He hated everything about it. He hated the way it wormed its way into his life, catching him off-guard at the most inconvenient of times. He hated how it made everything seem worse than it really was. But what he hated most of all was how he reacted to it. He was in a constant battle with this absence of sense, fighting its belittling effects with all the vigor he could muster.

The only problem was, this battle against himself wasn't one he could use his strengths with. It was a fight without the adrenaline, the muscle, or the feeling of an impact to tell you if you've hit your opponent. In the world of thought and willpower, there was no signal; one simply had to guess, or scour the opposition for any signs of weakness. And subtleties weren't something Joey was very good at.

Hence, his inevitable failure every single day, at keeping his mind from mulling over the doubts and discrepancies in his life. It wasn't so much the mulling over part he hated, but the feeling he got from it—like he was completely incapable of doing anything right, or that he was confused, or lost…or a little bit of it all. And if there was one thing Joey hated the most, it was feeling confused.

Of course he wasn't confused. He knew what he was doing. He knew what was going on around him, and he knew how to react to it. He knew who was with him, and who against him, who admired him and who despised him, and he knew how to keep them all in check.

This was Joey's crowning glory.

So why did his mind grab onto other things? Why did he think about failing, when things were going so well? Why did he think about losing everything he had? And why did these thoughts haunt him constantly?

The struggle was its most gruesome after nightfall. Staring at the ceiling in the bedroom of his solitary three-room apartment, it all seemed real to him. All the nightmares, all the unnerving knots of doubt churning in his stomach…it was the only thing that existed in the silent shadowy space around him, when not even the traffic noises below reached him, six stories up.

On the days he came home before nightfall, he let the nonsensical babble of the radio drive away his thoughts. Not that he liked music all that much, but it was a hell of a lot better than the alternative. He tried to avoid that situation as much as possible, though; he was on two different soccer teams, he held a part-time job, and he went to school when he needed to. He also went to every get-together he was invited to, and crashed ones he knew about. Not that anyone minded, most of the time; Joey Wheeler was the fun guy, anyway—he could liven up any situation.

Joey believed in that, during the daytime, when only a small part of his attention could be turned to it, the other part on the thousands of other things were churning around him.

But there were always the times when he was left out of things—the serious things that didn't involve friends. And it was during those times he endured the meaningless nattering and laughing of hosts whose names he had never bothered to learn, and the relentless repeating of the songs he only danced to at parties because they were playing.

Then there came the point where it was inappropriate; the people above him would complain about his music being so loud so late, or he just couldn't stand it anymore himself. The house was dark, and the life outside of it had changed completely to something where songs about teenage love and loss just didn't fit.

Sometimes he fell asleep right away—and that was a blessing on its own. But when he didn't…it was as if he were falling apart at the seams. He'd think about the things he'd rather forget. He'd think about the possibility of his life being an act, which he knew it wasn't. This was who he always was. He was always outgoing, carefree, and energetic…right?

He really didn't know anymore.

His mind would pull out the worst memories he held in the depths of his consciousness, and replay them so vividly Joey found himself reaching out to people in the dark, senses dulled in the fog of half-sleep—a state he then tried to relax himself out of.

Most of the time he'd never get past it; he'd suddenly realize he was seeing the early fingers of a new dawn filtering through his blinds and he'd curse himself, aware that he had been tricked, once again, by what he couldn't reach out and strangle.

Maybe that's why he tried to reach out to that which he could, and took advantage of it. The ones that complained about it he would leave alone; after all, they advocated their own feelings to others—that was a good thing. Although there were some that just kept silent, when he saw his own two hands drawing blood, and bruising skin. Usually, that only lasted a little while; they got sick of it, they'd tell, Joey'd get in trouble, and then he'd leave them alone. They had a spine; they deserved to be left alone.

There was one person, though, who hadn't said anything…ever. Never in the eight years Joey had known him.

Maybe Joey wanted to instill something in Yugi. Maybe he just wanted to know why he didn't move. And in the impenetrable darkness of his mind, Joey wondered if _he_ had killed him, once upon a time. Was he the reason Yugi was dead to the world? Did _he _make it real? Or did Yugi really not care enough to notice the pathetic life he led?

The questions made Joey's head hurt.

And he didn't like his head hurting all that much. He liked to keep things simple, and clear cut. The things that weren't simple weren't worth worrying about, or thinking about.

Whether this was a bad way of looking at things or not, Joey really didn't know anymore. Not that he had been concerned with good and bad all that much in the fist place; to him, life was just a battle between what could consume you, and what you could own—and which would protect you more effectively against the other.

It was a test of smarts.

But Joey had never been smart. This he knew well. There was a reason he kept coming back here to the ISS room, after all. There was a reason he kept throwing his fist when his better judgment told him not to—a reason why he let that which was bigger than him grab a firm hold around his heart, to pull him into a panic in the dead of the night.

What that reason was, he still hadn't figured out. But while he was trying, he was using whatever ways he could to keep himself in control as much as he could. It was the only way not to fall under completely.

He supposed that it had something to do with the fact that the whole predicament wasn't simple. Therefore, he didn't want to think about it, let alone understand it. This was a theory he had been developing for a while, too, in the darkness of his solitude. But if that were true, he would have stopped wondering about Yami ages ago…right?

Joey paused in his reading of Mr. Dither's textbook assignment, as his mind wandered to the strange entity that had come to Domino in the middle of the semester.

Any way he cut it, Joey found Yami very annoying, and completely illogical. Maybe it was his obviously fake talks about making friends with anyone he wants, or whatever shit he had spit out at Yugi during detention. Joey swore, he sounded like a frickin' Disney movie, sometimes. All he needed was the music behind him, when he got onto one of his kicks.

Seriously—who went around making friends with the kid who got the most picked on? _That _was just insane…and even after Joey and he had gotten into the fight that had landed him here in the fist place, he still didn't let up.

Well—Joey had to admit, Yami _did_ win…but that was besides the point. He should have gotten a hint, anyway, right? After all, he may know how to hold his own against one, but Joey had friends. He had lots of friends, and they weren't midgets, either; they were the best Domino's athletic department had to offer. He knew he could take Yami on, if he wanted to.

The only problem was…did he?

Joey rolled his eyes. Of course he wanted to—why wouldn't he? Yami was way too serious for his own good, anyway—couldn't even take a joke for what it was worth…and to Joey, that was just annoying. People should be able to take jokes. Like the one sided willow thing. That should have been funny, not a threat.

Plus there was the fact that he seemed to get Jim involved. What was it that he had said? 'Maybe he just likes to judge people on his own'?

_Damn idiot_, Joey thought, as his hand tightened around his pencil. Didn't Yami know that you couldn't judge people on your own! It wasn't just about how they were around you—and if that's all people went by, there would be a lot more shit happening in the world than there was now. And that was saying something.

No…people had to see how truthful someone was—whether they were lying or not. Whether they liked to please everyone, or just you. There was a big difference—one that Joey kept himself aware of, constantly. Sure, it made for a very wary way of living, but it made you safe. Hell, the only person he trusted was Honda. And that's because he was around him most of the time. Plus, Honda was just cool like that; he kept his word.

He'd been thinking that about Jim, too, but…looks like he couldn't keep things straight in his head, much less outside of it. Especially if he was thinking that Yami's bullshit made more sense than what his friends said.

_That_ had just set Joey off; of course he didn't make sense! He was a jerk that liked to sound good, that was all. Yami may have known how to persuade people, but Joey knew how to make things work! This guy was a newbie, coming in to a very different kind of life from that all-boys school shit he was at before, or wherever he was. Not that it mattered—he was treading on known turf. And Joey was going to use that to his advantage. After all, he had asked for it; HE was the one trying to mess things up.

Look at what he had done to Yugi. Whatever he had told him, it was making him a lot more vocal than before.

He was finally saying something about what Joey had been doing since…forever. He could still hear the exact words he had yelled at him in a voice Joey never though he'd hear from the Midget;

"_You can stop talking about me anytime now! It's sickening that you haven't felt guilty yet, after all this time!"_

Sickening…what a word for it. Joey hadn't known what to say to that, right away. And if that hadn't stunned Joey enough; what Yugi had said to Yami had just blown him out of the water;

"_You think you're helping! You think you're really making things easier? I don't need your help right now! It's not even help! If anything, you've made things worse! That was the first time this year I've been beaten up! And I have a feeling that if you weren't around I wouldn't have been!"_

Blaming Joey's incurable stupidity on Yami…THAT was harsh. But Yami came back with some of that mushy bullshit that Joey had come to loathe, over the short time Yami had been here. Something about dealing with things instead of leaving them be.

Sounded familiar.

Joey shook his head, and tried to focus on what was in front of him again. Of course that wasn't what he was doing. _That_ was bullshit, in Joey's opinion. If something was that important, it would present itself to you, right? It would make itself known as being important, and then you'd deal with it.

Simple as that.

And that's what he told Yami, after getting over the shock of such a volatile fight. They really had been mad, Joey could tell. Yami would be a good ally, if he weren't so…ugh. Joey didn't even know a word for it.

But what Yami had come back with was…different.

"…_and why would I want to just spit stuff out to 'look good'? Why wouldn't I just tell him the truth?"_

"_You think I'm putting on a show? Sorry to disappoint you, but I'm being serious!"_

Somehow, Joey didn't believe that. It sounded too much like it was rehearsed. Which gave him the idea of asking,

"_This isn't the first time you've done this, is it? Gotten into other people's business. Stood up for them. Played the hero."_

And his answer had made Yami seem…more believable, much as Joey hated to admit it. He seemed, at that point…right?

He was being serious?

That had just blown Joey out of the water—for the second time, during that very odd detention. He said he wanted to clean up others' messes—and that's why he was meddling in Yugi's business.

After that, a strange feeling had washed over Joey that was…indescribable; it was so different from anything he had ever felt before, he was shocked by it. It was the same feeling he got, sometimes, after realizing he had just beaten someone up. And as much a he hated the word, this was what it had been concocted to describe in the first place;

Guilt.

When he thought about Yami making sense, all he felt was guilt.

And when he thought about things that way, Joey made himself seem like a horrible person. Not that this was a new realization, but to that degree…it was overpowering.

He knew he was horrible, sometimes. He saw the fear and apprehension in other people's faces, when he start yelling. When he could hear his own voice echoing off the walls, and people's faces start to fall into their grim, serious mask, and that fearful grip around his heart only get tighter, he knew things were bad. It wasn't long after that when he started throwing punches.

He would hit until he got it all out—until his rebellion was laying there in front of him, bloodied and broken. It was only then when he stared breathing normally, again.

It was only when the adrenaline had worn off when he started getting confused again. Had he really wanted to do that in the first place? Why did he do that? His mind bombarded him with questions like these—the ones he couldn't answer, didn't want to answer, the ones he wished would just go away…and then—

He felt weak.

Helpless.

A victim, almost.

A victim that would never learn to be anything else. After all…he kept ending up in that state of mind, didn't he?

Joey shook his head, and looked back at the clock. It was ten.

God_dammit_…he still had the rest of the day in here…

And so he bowed his head down, eyes unfocused, his homework a blur in front of him. How representative.

And now he had a headache to deal with on top of it.

Just fucking great.

He hated silence.

* * *

A/N: I know, I know; it's not that long, and it's not on what I'm sure you guys are wanting it to be on. But consider it a breather—a rather confusing breather, but it's supposed to be confusing); I needed to explain some things before I went on with things, so…here it is. A nice, silent day in ISS, inside Joey's mind. Surprising how much is in there, actually…

Lol—I'm so mean to him…I never thought I would be, before this fic. But now I am. ah, well.

Out of curiosity, how many authors leave really long review responses for you guys? Is it just me, or are there others out there that blab for incessant amounts of time? Just a thought that occurred to me… not very important.


	18. Yugi

A/N: Allrighty, up with the plotline again. Now that Joey's human again (not akin to the beauty and the beast song…though that's a funny mental image, Joey dancing around with cogsworth and lumiere…) we can all take a peek inside Yugi's mind.

Here we go…

Chapter title: Yugi

* * *

Why the hell did the ceiling have to be white?

If he stared at it for long enough, and let his eyes slide out of focus, Yugi could just imagine four walls around him just as blank, endless, and sterile. The door would be large—too heavy to push, even—and it would have a small window at eye level that the world could look at him through, either to observe him in his wild behaviors or pity him for the same.

But when he blinked—

He could see the posters hung on his walls, the bookshelf in the corner, his desk with his latest book set on it, all out of the corner of his eye. He could even see part of the closet door, if he shifted his listless stare a little to the left.

One would think this was better than the first—the lifeless atmosphere of that imaginary prison couldn't compare to a room full of pictures, books, trinkets…a life.

But Yugi didn't feel like that.

To him right now, it may as well be the same.

His mother lived in this home, after all—and she wasn't any different than those who spent their days in the single white room. She wasn't much different at all.

Yugi shook his head, blinking, as he felt the searing sting of yet another threat of tears.

He hadn't wanted to cry this much in a long time. Hell, he didn't remember crying like this at all; his memories were full of a blank face, devoid of any hints of emotion, or feeling. Yet now…

He felt as though he had been ripped open, and he couldn't get himself shut again. He couldn't even cover himself up, anymore; not after detention yesterday. Not after last evening. He was sure that if anyone from school were to see him now, they would be shocked, and appalled. The Midget had feelings. He actually hurt.

Thank god he was hidden. Even if it was just in his room; only Grandpa knew where he was, right now.

That's what he should be, after all. Hidden from everyone and everything, because he was so unsure of himself he didn't know what was going to jump out of his mouth next.

Was he even himself anymore?

No...not this. This wasn't Yugi Motou.

And as he lay there, staring at that clean white space above him, he wondered when, exactly, he had lost himself. Where had he gone to? Who was it that had come home yesterday? Who was it that had yelled at Yami and Joey?

What had snapped?

Yugi closed his eyes, and wished that he could fall asleep again. Couldn't he still be tired? He didn't want to be awake. Not right now; things were too quiet, and he hurt too much, both physically and figuratively. And that was a lot of pain.

But now that his eyes were closed, his mind's vivid memories replayed for him what had happened last evening—what had landed him in his bed, still dressed from yesterday, staring at the ceiling…

* * *

Yugi didn't know how he made it home, that day. His mind was spinning with so many emotions and thoughts, he didn't even think of where he was going. Luckily, his body knew where to go, and continued on autopilot without him.

When he got home, he ran through the shop, wrenched open the door that led to his and Grandpa's living quarters, and stumbled up the stairs to the second level of the building. He didn't quite make it onto the last step, and ended up falling flat on his face in the front hallway.

"Aah--!"

He was in the house now; he could cry out in pain if he wanted. He rolled slowly into a sitting position, taking off his backpack and shoving it into the doorway to the kitchen to the right as he did so. He then wrapped his arms around his middle, and scooted to the edge of the top stair, staring down at the door without really seeing it.

God_damn_, that hurt…everything hurt. Everything was just beginning to develop into what he would be able to see the next day, he was sure. It wasn't a very comforting thought; Yugi never did like seeing himself covered in bruises.

Not that he had that much time to think it. Suddenly, Yugi noticed that the door to the shop was opening slowly, and Grandpa's head was poking out from behind it. Yugi's eyes widened, and he pulled his uniform jacket around him more tightly.

Crap.

Grandpa came home after he did, usually, from his daily walk…but Yugi realized that it was way later than he thought it was, and he had just run through the game shop without saying anything. And tripped up the stairs. And cried out in pain.

Grandpa merely regarded him with large violet eyes for a moment, taking in what Yugi was desperately trying to cover up. After a while he blinked, and asked,

"What happened?"

Yugi shook his head; he didn't trust himself to speak. He tried to tell Grandpa through a blank expression that nothing had happened, and that he was fine. It worked, usually. The last time it hadn't was freshman year, when Joey had first beat him up in high school.

Grandpa walked the rest of the way through the door, and closed it behind him, his stare at Yugi turned more shrewd.

Yugi tried to hold his blank look. This was bad, if Grandpa wasn't buying it. Inwardly, Yugi started to panic, as Grandpa made his way up the stairs. _What was wrong with him? Why couldn't he throw Grandpa off!_

"Tell me what's wrong, Yugi," Grandpa stated, as he sat down next to Yugi on the top stair. Yugi merely looked forward again, and didn't reply.

"I don't expect you to come home right away," Grandpa continued, "But you have to admit that an hour and a half is enough time to walk to school and back twice. Yet it took you that amount of time just to get home." He paused here, and Yugi leaned forward again, still staring ahead. His fingers were losing their circulation, he was holding so tightly to the sides of his uniform jacket.

"Something happened you didn't expect," Grandpa stated.

Yugi didn't respond. _Keep silent, _he thought_, Neutrality._ He was neither proving nor disproving anything. And that was the best he could do, right now. Let Grandpa figure out what he wanted to, but he wasn't going to tell him what really happened.

He hadn't been for the past four years; he wasn't going to start now. Grandpa didn't need to know about Joey, or Yami, or anyone else. He could handle this on his own…

"You're not taking it well," Grandpa pried. Yugi could feel him move closer. He still stared ahead.

They stayed like that for quite a while, the silence pressing in on Yugi, making him feel nervous. This he was thrown by, too; he never felt nervous about keeping something from Grandpa. He always succeeded; there was nothing to be nervous about. But what happened next didn't make Yugi's apprehension ebb at all.

Suddenly, a chill washed over the hallway—like a blast of cold air from outside. But the only windows near the hallway were those in the living room, and they were never open.

Yugi stiffened. This wasn't good.

"Yugi…"

The voice didn't sound anything like Grandpa's—and once he realized that, Yugi's insides felt colder than his back had mere seconds ago.

He blinked, and looked up.

"Grandpa?" he croaked out; his throat had become very dry, suddenly.

"Yes?" Grandpa asked, eyes lighting up slightly, as he prepared for whatever Yugi was going to tell him. But Yugi turned his wide eyes past Grandpa's hopeful gaze, and into the hallway behind them.

Another chill, and he barely registered a translucent figure facing him before he jumped up with a yell, turning to face the figure that was floating there, icy eyes boring right into Yugi's.

"What is it?" Grandpa asked, looking down the hallway, then back to Yugi.

But Yugi was too preoccupied with the ghost to even hear Grandpa's inquiries.

"W—What the heck do you want from me!" Yugi asked, aware of the rising panic in his voice, "Why are you here?"

"Yugi?" Grandpa asked, though his voice sounded distant now, "What's going on?"

The ghost floated towards him, still staring at him.

"STOP!" Yugi yelled suddenly, startling even himself with the severity of his voice. "GO AWAY! I DON'T HAVE ANYTHING YOU WANT!"

The room suddenly plunged into temperatures that stunned Yugi into a frightened, frozen silence, and the figure suddenly stuttered into better focus—more clearly than it ever had before. Its mouth opened slightly, and it spoke in that English laden with such an accent Yugi couldn't place on any one language that he knew.

"You will see me soon," he said.

"_W—what_?" Yugi whispered; he really wasn't capable of much else, at the moment.

"Yugi—"

"The key will be found, and you will see me," the figure iterated. It gave him a pointed look, and started to crackle away again, bowing its head as it did so.

And once the cold atmosphere had faded away with the ghost, Yugi found his voice again.

"What Key! What the heck!"

"YUGI!"

Yugi jumped, and was roughly yanked around to stare into a pair of large, violet eyes. He swallowed.

"W—what did you see, Yugi?" he asked softly. "Was there…someone there?"

And like the dumb idiot he was, Yugi sighed shakily, and started talking. On reflection, Yugi supposed he was too shaken to even think of what the consequences would be, or what Grandpa would think. Right then, all he knew was that he had been asked a question, and he knew the answer to it. Therefore, he told Grandpa everything.

"Yeah," he said, nodding, "It was…I don't know. I think it was a ghost. He was dressed in white, I know that… and he had lots of jewelry on…and he told me that there was a key that would be found, and that when it was, I would see him again."

Yugi looked up at Grandpa again, and saw that his eyes held a sadness he thought he would never see directed at him in his life.

"Grandpa?" Yugi asked. Grandpa shook his head, and his grip on Yugi's shoulders became tighter.

"When a ghost enters the room, Yugi," he said, his voice slightly unsteady, "everyone sees it, or at least feels it. I felt nothing."

Yugi's eyes widened.

"N—Not even…cold? It was really cold, I swear—" But something in Grandpa's eyes made Yugi falter in his explanation. A glint of something that he didn't bother to cover up, and that startled Yugi greatly—

Fear.

Grandpa was frightened.

"But—" Yugi looked back to where the ghost was, and pointed, "He was right there. He was floating…I'm not making this up…"

"That's what I'm afraid of, Yugi," Grandpa said quietly. Yugi turned to him again.

"Why?"

"Who else saw things that no one else could see, or feel?"

Yugi frowned for a moment, ignoring the searing pain Grandpa's grip was creating on his right shoulder.

"Think, Yugi," Grandpa urged. "And if you can't, I'm not going to tell you. Just know that if this keeps happening, I'll have to do something. And I don't want to, Yugi. I don't want to have to call anyone." Grandpa's last sentence was strangled out, as though he were holding back tears as he said it.

"What? Call—" Yugi said, trying to figure it out—

Then it clicked.

Yugi felt as though he had been thrown against a brick wall; he was stunned, suddenly out of air and unable to think to inhale.

That same phrase he had only heard once in his life before, from Grandpa. It had been heard from the end of the hallway where all the bedrooms were, outside what was now Grandpa's room. He would be leaning against the door, yelling it through the crack between it and the doorframe as the person on the other side screamed at the top of their lungs, pounding the doors and walls in a rage none of them knew the origins of.

Grandpa called them 'episodes'. Yugi now was yelling at things only he could see, and he was now swearing up and down that they were real.

Just like Mom used to do.

He was turning into Mom.

"NO!" Yugi suddenly shouted out, panic flooding through him like a shock, "Grandpa, it's not like that! I'm not insane—"

"I don't want it to be," Grandpa interrupted, taking a steadying breath and regarding Yugi with a scrutinizing eye.

"Maybe it's something else. Maybe you're stressed, and that's why you're seeing things."

But Yugi was shaking his head vigorously.

"I'm fine, I'm just…I don't know, but I'm not stressed, or anything—ah!"

For suddenly, a pain in his side had decided to flare up again, and it was too much to ignore. Yugi cringed, and held his side, trying to forget it was there.

"Yugi?"

"I'm fine—" Yugi gasped. But Grandpa wasn't listening. He instead wrapped his arm around another sensitive spot on Yugi's arm, and proceeded to pull him across their small house.

"Ow—!" was all Yugi could manage out, as he stumbled to keep up. Suddenly they were in Yugi's room, and Grandpa was using his hold on Yugi's arm to sit Yugi down on his bed.

"What—" Yugi started to ask, but Grandpa cut him off.

"You look dead, Yugi. You need rest, and whatever is hurting your side is going to only get worse if you keep walking around."

"But—"

"I don't want to hear any excuses," Grandpa said, the volume of his voice increasing to drown out Yugi's protests.

"You've used them too often already! You think I don't know that you're worried sick about your mother, even though you'd just like to forget it? And you may not tell me what's going on at school, but when you come home like this, I wonder if I ought to start interrogating you when you get home every day! And now with this…" Grandpa shook his head, obviously lost for words.

Yugi just sat on his bed, hand still placed limply on the side that had started hurting again, wondering where this new man standing before him had come from. His whole demeanor had changed; he was agitated, pacing, running his fingers through his gray hair, and—strangest of all—he was yelling. Grandpa never yelled—not since Mom was still there…and that had been forever ago.

Grandpa sighed heavily, running his hand through his hair again.

"Yugi…I give you the freedom to come to me when you're feeling bad about something. Though obviously, I haven't been telling you that often enough; you're choking under the weight of whatever problems you have, and I don't even know what could have caused it. And now…you're so emotionally distraught that you're seeing things."

"But it's not—"

"Yugi," Grandpa cut off again, his voice much more gentle this time. He pulled the rolling desk chair out from Yugi's desk, and rolled it over to sit in front of Yugi. He then looked Yugi in the eye, and asked,

"Do you really think apparitions just pop into people's line of vision at random?"

Yugi blinked, and silently shook his head. He didn't know where this was going, but he didn't make the effort to try and guess, either; his mind was too fried, anyway…

"When your body is stressed, or traumatized, it's more vulnerable to things. These…apparitions might be one of them. After all, it's only in a creepy, dark place one sees the figure of someone floating in a corner. It's only after a family member has died that one sees them standing before them, smiling. Do you think there isn't any correlation there?"

Yugi was silent, as his mind processed the information. And when he thought about it, it really made sense. It was when he first heard about Mom and her engagement that he had seen the ghost for the first time. The second time, he was preparing to head into a minefield of a detention room. And just now…he had come back from that minefield, confused beyond belief.

"Get some rest, Yugi," Grandpa said, bringing Yugi out of his thoughts by giving him a consoling pat on the shoulder. I'll come back later this evening to give you something to eat, but you're not permitted to leave this room for anything. I'll be right out in the living room. If you need anything, just say so."

And he got up, knowing that Yugi knew better than to disobey him.

"I'm not like Mom," Yugi stated, when Grandpa was at the door. He paused, and turned to look at Yugi, who was giving him a determined look—almost a glare, he decided. And even though Yugi hadn't worded it that way, Grandpa got the feeling Yugi was asking him, in his own strange way. He took a breath, and tried to answer what he could.

"People end up the way they are for a reason. Part of it's biological. Part of it is the life around your body. I'd like to think you could change, Yugi. That this is all just some…stress reaction you can talk yourself out of. But the only person who knows that for sure is standing in front of me." He gave Yugi a very small smile.

"Given that, I can't really tell you if you are or not. Part of you is—half of who you are came from her. That's not going to change. But what half that is is not something I know. That's only something that you know, and no one else can tell you. That's all I can tell you."

And with that, he walked out the door, left it open a crack, and headed back downstairs to the shop, where he proceeded to close things up slightly earlier than usual.

Yugi sat still for a long while, his mind spinning with all sorts of questions, and thoughts.

Like why he felt so disarmed, suddenly. His façade had been seen through, his ways of handling things critiqued in a very unpleasant way, and his own mouth throwing out the window every kind of defense he had built up over the course of most of his life to battle the horrors that constantly bombarded him. All in one day.

And his first instinct was to pick them up again, and snap them back into place, into their designated spots that had been carved so well for them.

But there was one question that hesitated him from doing so. One thought that stopped him from shoving everything down again into its place that was so well molded for it.

If he was so stressed, or whatever he was…and he was suddenly reminding Grandpa of Mom…what would happen if he kept on doing this?

He remembered Mom at her worst. He remembered not being able to sleep at night, because she was down the hallway yelling at things both he and Grandpa knew weren't there. There were days she wouldn't even notice Yugi was there. She would start talking to Dad, instead.

Yugi gasped aloud at the realization, ignoring the pain that shot through his chest as he did so.

Seeing things no one else thought was there.

And what had Grandpa just said? "It's only after a family member has died that one sees them standing before them, smiling."

It was already happening.

If he kept doing this, was _he_ going to run off to wherever this ghost told him to?

Was he going to put Grandpa through that hell—again?

"I'm not like that…" Yugi whispered, feeling a constricted shock start to clench his chest. His throat suddenly closed up, and for the first time in he didn't know how long, he felt the sting of tears just beyond his eyelids, instead of further down, where he knew he could will them away.

There was no will this time.

Yugi had run out of that somewhere in the middle of the school day, today. Or maybe it was yesterday. He really didn't know anymore.

All he knew was that he was wiping away frantically the tears that were rolling down his cheeks, trying to believe they weren't there. He let himself fall back onto his bed, arm over his eyes, as he tried to calm himself down. He succeeded, after a while, but with Herculean efforts.

A part of him felt like this was something he had been wanting to do for a long while. But he didn't feel ready for it just yet; he still felt…guarded, in some senses. He didn't know why; there was no one else in the room, and Grandpa had just come up from the shop—Yugi heard the door shut, its slam echoing slightly in the stairwell leading up to their floor.

And that made Yugi wonder if it was more than just the world that was forcing him to be like this.

Were there really parts of himself that were guarded? To himself?

Yugi lay there for a long time, thinking about it. He turned over the possibilities in his mind, and crept into those places in his trains of thought he had always glanced over before.

He found a lot more there than he ever expected to find. Fears, he knew. Doubts, he knew.

But resentment? Guilt? Hate? The feelings shot through him quickly, and with intensity.

Where was all this coming from? Was it really him?

Yugi didn't really know. He didn't know if the 'him' he knew was actually himself, or if the 'him' he knew was only half of what was actually boiling inside him?

Or was he even paying attention to the part of him that was boiling? What about those passionate emotions? Where were they?

The answer was still evading him, when Grandpa came in with dinner. The only conclusion he had come to at that point was that one could really learn a lot by just thinking. It was amazing what went on in his own mind. Yugi was surprised he had never taken the time to look at it before. It was frightening, yes. But at the same time…amazing.

Yugi noticed Grandpa had gone out of the way to make what he usually did when Yugi was sick; his favorite kind of tea, with macaroni and cheese. It was simple, warm, and it usually calmed down whatever was ailing Yugi at the time enough for him to drift off to sleep.

And this time was no different.

He didn't even know he had fallen asleep, until he was once again staring at the ceiling in the early hours of the morning, having gotten enough sleep by then anyway. This time, he hadn't thought to turn off his light. And so, the ceiling he was staring at was pure white, unmarred by any shadows of the night outside.

* * *

He opened his eyes again, and sighed heavily. Yeah, he was still confused. He was confused about a lot of things. And he felt kind of sick…

But he didn't want to miss school because of it. It was tempting, but…he just had a feeling he should be there.

And so, he fended off Grandpa, telling him he was feeling better than he was; the rest did him good. That much was true, anyway.

No one talked to him, either, which was strangely nice. He was expecting that at least Yami would walk up and say something to him. He didn't know why, but Yami always said something. It was just his way of things.

But he simply stared ahead in homeroom, lost in his own world. Or so Yugi figured. He wasn't really up on his usual figuring habits, at the moment. For once in his life, he was figuring more about himself than the outside world. Strangely enough…it was somewhat calming. Yugi didn't know why. After all, he knew what he didn't want to be; and that's what he was. But what he did want to be…he really didn't know.

Although the outside world did throw him for a loop, after the first period of the day. In the form of the very person who had caused him at least part of his pains for so long; Yugi was hesitantly willing to admit that now.

"'ey."

Yugi only turned around because of the tap on his shoulder. And his eyes met with those of Joey Wheeler, looking very awkward and holding a World History textbook, which he promptly shoved in Yugi's direction hastily.

"Ya left dis in Hist'ry coupla days ago," he slurred out quickly. Yugi had to run the sound through his mind a couple of times to decode the accent. Although once he had, the sentence still didn't make much sense…

Blinking rather stupidly, Yugi held out his hand for the textbook, feeling its familiar weight yank his hand down as he got a grip on it.

Joey cleared his throat and shuffled off, disappearing amongst the rest of the crowd that was bustling to get to next period.

And Yugi just stood there, completely and utterly confused.

* * *

A/N: …and this was a lot longer than I thought it was going to be. Man… guess I had a lot to say.

Not that you guys mind, I'm sure.


	19. Yami

A/N: I'M BACK!

First off, I am sorry for the delay; I have been gone for the past three weeks vacation-type adventures. And now, I've come home to a new home (the place we've been living in for the past three years isn't even ours anymore) that is in total chaos, needing my help as much as my lifting skills have been missed by the family.

That is, to say, a lot.

SO, about half this chapter was done on the run (in between painting walls and hauling furniture), and the other half was done before all of this happened. And yet another little bit of it was written while I was first outlining the entire story, before it even had a chapter assigned to it.

Just some background info. And to let you know that I have not indeed fallen off the face of the earth, as some of you more offbeat people may have concluded.

And the more rational of you probably just thought I had been delayed. Or maybe you didn't notice the delay at all

Whatever the case, I now give you the chapter that I've been trying to write for around a month, now—and it's thirteen pages long, too; my longest yet, I believe…

Enjoy.

Chapter title: Yami

* * *

"_This isn't something I can just switch off!" _

"_Neither is that necklace, Yami! You _can_ force yourself to change! You _can't_ force that necklace to! You're only taking your own life if you refuse to do this, and that is NOT something I'm going to let you do!"_

"_When you put it that way, you make it sound like I'm going to commit suicide!" _

"_WELL THAT'S WHAT YOU _ARE _DOING!" _

Midnight.

Yami had had to lift himself off his spot in front of the door to see his alarm clock on his desk. Much as he didn't want to, a part of him was wondering why the house had gotten quiet, all the sudden. Then he realized;

Everyone had gone to bed.

Mom had tried to talk to him, after the fight. But he hadn't responded to her. After trying to get his attention for more than a minute—he was sure it was more than a minute, it seemed like forever she was there, calling his name and knocking on the door—she finally had just left, with a sad sigh.

He'd have to ask about that later, what she had wanted to say. If it even applied, then…

No one else had come up to say anything else. He had heard Mom and Dad talking about something in the living room, but he didn't know what; this room was too far away for him to eavesdrop properly—and he didn't think he could pull off another sneak-around-the-corner-before-you're-seen gimmick.

Everyone knew how well _that_ had worked out…

Yami sighed, and sniffed. Not that it was much use, now; all that he hadn't blown onto his sleeve was stuck in his head. He could feel the pains of a very bad sinus headache already coming on…

"Ugh," he croaked to the ceiling, where he was currently staring absently. Before that it had been the foot of his bed. And before that, it was his shoes.

He felt drained. Absolutely drained, as though someone had sucked all his energy out of him, but had left him awake enough to feel his aching muscles he didn't know had been tensed from stress until now. And awake enough to feel the blank confusion his mind was in. He felt like he could think, and yet couldn't, at the same time.

Ever since he had stopped crying, he had been thinking in a lilting way, drifting from one half-thought to the next, not really paying attention to what his mind settled on. Like everything at once was hitting him, and none of it made sense.

Then again, he had been feeling like that before he had started crying, too. Back downstairs.

He didn't know what had happened until he was up in his room, the full seriousness of his realization hitting him all at once.

'_You're only taking your own life if you refuse to do this,'_ Dad had said. Yami would commit suicide, if he let himself unleash the demon onto the world by refusing to pass it on.

Yami remembered vaguely one of the many accounts of the necklace he had read, in the copy of the papers about the curse Dad had made for him, when he had first gotten the necklace. Someone had refused to pass it on before. He forgot why, but he remembered that the demon had appeared in this dimension—one of the few times it had—and it had eaten the souls of all the man's friends, and his mother, who had borne the necklace before him. He had complied after that, and had married the woman he had fallen in love with. And when it came time to pass the necklace on, the moment the necklace was fastened around the man's son, the demon had taken his soul, too.

He remembered, after reading that story, thinking about how awful it would be. How could he live with himself, if the demon had taken all the souls of everyone that was important to him? All because he refused to pass on a necklace to his child? A child whose blood had to be half his, in order for the necklace to accept it. If it wasn't his, the necklace burned the child—to death.

And yet…that's exactly what Yami wanted to do. Now that he thought about it, he realized that leaving it all behind was a hope he'd been holding on to for a long time, in the back of his mind. He didn't know how he had come to think that there was a way to escape in the first place, when he had been told constantly that there wasn't. Maybe it was a defense, against himself. Maybe it was a trick his mind had played for him, to make the pain of such an intensely depressing thought that much easier to handle.

"_You _can_ force yourself to change! You _can't_ force that necklace to_!"

That's what had made him stop, in the middle of Dad's outburst. It wasn't the fact that Dad had just told him Yami's doing anything else other than what he determined would be suicide (although that was certainly something that had propelled him up the stairs)--it was the fact that this was his life they were talking about.

The rest of his _life_.

Life was a big thing. And what was going to determine his wasn't his choices, like the teachers liked to say. It wasn't his parents, which was so often a discrepancy people his age looked for in themselves and avoided like the plague. Not even his own goals, and hopes.

It was a chain. A thin, golden, almost weightless chain, so small he could swallow it with no difficulty, if he had wanted to. And when he compared it to something as large and ambiguous as that part of the future that was his, whose details he knew nothing about...it was overwhelming. He was confined from that which he didn't know he was being kept from.

Now more than ever, he felt caged. Claustrophobic, in a world housing billions of other souls like his. He felt like he would suffocate just by breathing too much air in at one time, that he'd break something if he stretched out too far.

He couldn't live.

He couldn't do the one thing that every human being is given the gift of being able to do, just by being born.

The only thing _he_ was here to do was to curse onto another that which was cursed onto him. He realized now that there was no stopping that day when he would unclasp the horror from his neck, and imprison a part of the world he had helped to create--a part of the world that was still so innocent and unassuming.

But…he had to do it. Dad was right.

It was strange, times like this—times when you realized what a moment you've just been through, and how influential that moment was going to be on you from here on out.

That fight, he knew, was the end of all the illusions he had conceived to hide himself, once upon a time. He had to come to face what was his to face, now, and make something of it. Sure, it wasn't what most people were handed when they were told to grow up. But they all had to deal with it.

And so did Yami.

For a long time after that, Yami simply stared some more, this time at his belongings scattered about his room, illuminated by to dying light bulbs overhead. It gave everything a strange, yellowish glow that just added to Yami's feeling of being boxed in—especially since the curtains were closed.

It was an arrangement that had never bothered him before. But things changed with time. Everything did.

Even immortality.

And Yami knew about that; he was, in a sense. Until the day he passed the necklace on, he couldn't die. The only catch was, he couldn't just postpone his death until he felt like it; he still aged, and he still felt pain.

But he couldn't die.

He supposed he should feel happy, or lucky, about that. After all, immortality was something that people so often wished for, in the fairy tales and such. Or even in real life, sometimes, he knew people at least wondered about it. And here Yami was, walking amongst their midst, keeping hidden the seemingly impossible fact. He could injure himself to the point that he was mere inches from it, breathing nothing but seas of pain--but he couldn't cross over that final threshold while the necklace was still around his neck.

Lucky. Given the context, it was an extremely harsh word.

Still…it was something that wasn't entirely depressing. And optimism was something Yami was almost desperate for, at the moment.

With that, he started to think of some other things about the necklace that were positive…and ended up thinking about nightmares.

Given any other situation, this would have been a bad thing. But for Yami, nightmares were both a little bit of bad and good, the bad part obviously being the nightmare. The good part was in the morning, when he would tell Dad all about it. He didn't know how he had developed the habit of telling Dad all the details of his nightmares, but apparently it had started when Yami was still very young. And over the years, Dad had listened to him, making a comment here or there, asking a question to clarify, discreetly pushing the last of his cereal away if Yami went into gory details.

Yami now gave a weak laugh, at the thought. If he had known Dad would bring up the ones he remembered for when he was sharing stories with other parents, Yami never would have done it. How many times had Yami walked in on Dad telling someone else's parents about when he heard about giant octopuses eating the elementary school over his cheerios? And how many times had Yami described in detail how Dad had died in his nightmare? Or Mom?

Another laugh escaped Yami, sounding a little less like a croak. And every time, they had found a way to laugh over it. Dad would tell Yami that his school was too far away for the octopi to crawl over and eat, and that by the time they got there, they'd be so dry they'd look like raisins. Or that if a Lion was running rampant through the house, it wouldn't be able to get up the stairs of their old house, they were so narrow. It would try—and then it would get stuck.

But if it was about the necklace, Dad wouldn't try and make it funny. Instead, he'd tell Yami something that made whatever he had dreamt about seem small, and far away.

He would tell him to think about the necklace this way; by wearing it and passing it on, he was saving people. Even though they didn't know it, they were being saved. He told Yami to think about all his friends and teachers and family, and how he was their hero because he was keeping the demon away from them so that they would never get hurt. But they mustn't ever know that—after all, superman doesn't walk around telling people who he is, right?

And Yami would nod, fingering the pendant as he listened, nightmares forgotten.

Of course, that only worked until Yami started wondering if there was a way he could take it off. And so the battle between him and it began.

A hero…

Thinking about his curse that way made Yami wonder now, about what other hidden secrets were going on out there; how many decisions were people making that were making his life better?. Or worse? What other monstrosities was he being kept from, by others? What had other people around him done in _their_ lives, to make his that much easier?

And what price had they paid for it?

Was it worse than his?

It was hard to imagine, but…there were ways, he was sure.

Yami yawned, and leaned his head back onto the door.

The rest of his life…

Being a hero?

Yami let the necklace fall from his fingers, where he didn't know he had been fiddling with it, and let his head fall onto his shoulder.

* * *

He didn't get the sleep he wanted to, that night. Before he knew it, he was flat on his back, staring up at a very groggy mother.

"Good morning," she said, looking down at him from behind his bedroom door. Yami looked down at himself, still in yesterday's clothes, his legs in his room and his torso out in the hallway. He must have fallen asleep still leaning against his door.

"'Morning," he managed, before getting up and starting to get ready for school.

Those were the only words that were said, that morning. Yami and Dad and Mom ate in silence at the kitchen table, the atmosphere around them more subdued than Yami ever remembered it being. It didn't feel right at all.

Then again, he didn't feel right, either. So he guessed it was fitting, in a weird sense. And it didn't stop at the breakfast table—Yami didn't speak again all throughout homeroom.

He almost did, when Yugi walked, in, but then he remembered detention yesterday, and decided against it. After all, he and Joey both knew that Yugi was very capable of speaking up. Whether he would or not was up to him.

Instead, he opened his binder to look at the things he didn't do for homework last night. He realized he had a test today in Algebra that he hadn't studied for. On matrices. Which he didn't know anything about.

…It was times like these that he wanted to curl up in a ball somewhere, and wait until everything was over. Yes, there was some optimism to think about when dealing with the curse, but in his morning grumpiness, Yami couldn't attribute them to anything more than a lame way of dealing with the fact that he was screwed for the rest of his life.

In other words, back at square one. Yami groaned, and put his head down on the desk.

_And _a test on matrices.

How much better could this day get?

His answer came after his failing the math test. Mrs. Robertson had approached him and a couple other students (the ones that Yugi had mentioned so long ago under the one-sided willow, strangely enough; his predictions were right), about tutoring after school. She said that they were all failing the class as a whole, and that she wanted them to pass at least, and aim for a B.

So now Yami failed twice in Math, in the same day.

It was with a particularly sour mood that Yami walked into gym class with, and as a result, he didn't really pay attention to where he set up to change. All he knew was that when he was getting his gym shirt on, he heard Honda's voice not that far away from him say,

"Hey, Jim."

"Hey."

There was a pause. Yami made sure his shoes were securely on his feet.

"…you know how you were saying yesterday about Yami making more sense than us?"

Yami paused, and looked around discreetly for Honda's and Jim's location. He didn't see them in the row he was in, but the voices were still close…

"Yeah…"

"Before Joey went to ISS this morning, he was telling me about at detention yesterday."

"What happened?"

"Well, Joey said that Yugi walked in to look for his book, or something, but then he started yelling at Yami about how he shouldn't be bugging him. Told him to let him deal with his own problems."

There was a silence. Yami narrowed it down to the lockers just around the corner, on the next row down. He didn't dare go past them now; even he had enough sense not to walk by while someone was having a conversation about him—especially when they didn't know he was within earshot.

"Oh," Jim said.

There was a whistle from coach; he wanted them to get ready faster, those who were still lingering. Yami waited until he knew Jim and Honda had left, then walked out himself.

The conversation didn't leave his mind all throughout the class period, though; especially what Honda said Jim had said yesterday—how Yami made more sense to Jim than Honda and Joey did.

It confused Yami more than anything. Especially considering that he didn't make sense to himself. There were a lot of things he did that he couldn't explain.

Yet he made sense to Jim.

…How?

The question still hadn't been answered, when Yami was making his way to German class. Rather, it had been set aside in favor of larger things to worry about. Like tutoring. And like the rest of his life.

He didn't know why he was still obsessing over it so much…hadn't he thought it through last night? Hadn't he come to a conclusion? Why was it getting thrown out the window now? It wasn't like he could do anything about it…he just had to accept the fact that he had a couple of hindrances on his life because he was cursed, and he had to deal with it. Why was this so hard! Why was he still thinking about it—

"Yami?"

Yami looked up from the spot on the wall he was staring at. Except now, it was obscured by Frau Mueller, who was standing in front of his desk and looking at him.

"Come with me outside for a moment," she said.

Yami slowly got up, wondering what he had done wrong—along with the rest of the class, by the sound of the murmuring that started up when he was walking across the front of the room.

Once they were both in the hallway, and Frau Mueller had shut the door securely, she turned to Yami and held up her hands.

"You're not in trouble, so don't worry about that. I just wanted to ask if you were feeling all right. You're not acting like yourself at all. Usually you're talking Anzu's ear off, but you're silent today."

Yami blinked, startled by the show of concern. He didn't think Frau knew him well enough to understand what Yami looked like when things weren't going all right…

Then again, it wasn't that hard.

Crap.

But what was he supposed to tell her? "I had this huge fight with my Dad about this cursed necklace that's been running in my family for years?" "I'm failing math?" "I'm going to be doomed to a life I don't want to live because of a piece of gold around my neck you've never seen, because I'm never supposed to tell anyone?" "I'm immortal and I hate it?"

Frau eyed him in his silence, waiting for an answer. Much in the same way his mother did, when trying to worm something out of him.

Finally, Yami just shook his head.

"No," he said. "I'm fine."

"All right..." Frau Mueller said, though Yami could tell she didn't believe him at all. She looked Yami over again, then sighed. "Well, if you ever need to talk just tell me, okay? I'm here after school most days, and I'm always here before school. My door is always open to you, all right?"

The show of such an open ear struck Yami, at that moment. He suddenly felt an overwhelming urge to throw all precautions and guards out the window, and just tell Frau Mueller everything right then and there. He even opened his mouth, preparing to start from the beginning--but he stopped himself just in time, and forced himself to choke out;

"No, I'm...fine...Thanks, though. For the, um...the offer."

Frau Mueller gave him another extremely suspicious look. Yami just nodded awkwardly, and tried not to hurry back inside the classroom too quickly, after she held open the door for him.

When he came back in, he noticed that Anzu was giving him a curious look. He just looked away, not really wanting to talk about it.

He didn't want to talk about anything, here—because the only thing he actually _wanted _to talk about was the one thing no one knew anything about.

Yami wondered if Superman ever had to stitch his mouth shut to keep things in.

Considering he was a cartoon character, probably not.

So much for hero.

Yami went back to staring at that spot on the wall. And when class was finally over, he was the first one to get out of the room.

Unfortunately, Anzu was the second one.

"Hey! Yami!"

Yami paused, and turned to see that Anzu had a hold of his arm. _Great_…now he wasn't noticing when people were grabbing him…what was next?

"Are you all right?" She asked. "You look really worried about something."

And again, much as he didn't want to, Yami nodded his head.

"I'm fine," he said. His voice was a lot less convincing than he would have liked, and Anzu certainly wasn't falling for it.

"No, you're not," she said. "I know what you look like when you're fine, and this isn't it."

"I've got to get to basketball practice," Yami said, starting forward again, not sure why he felt panicked, all the sudden.

"Yami—"

"I shouldn't talk about it here," Yami cut her off, pulling free of her arm. But she didn't let him go. She fell into stride beside him, and opened her mouth to protest again.

"I told you--" Yami started to say, but Anzu cut him off.

"It's about the necklace, isn't it?"

The rest of Yami's sentence faltered in the depths of his throat, and he stopped walking abruptly.

"I thought so." Anzu said, stopping ahead of him. "I can't think of anything else that would make you so agitated."

Yami sighed heavily. He'd forgotten Anzu had gotten burned…though how, he would never know.

"What happened?" Anzu pried. Yami shook his head.

"A lot of things did," he said, his voice much more quiet than it was before. "But I don't want to talk about it, it's just…it's just a bunch of stuff…"

Anzu was peering at him thoughtfully, sorrow obvious in her eyes.

"Judging by how you looked after Frau Mueller's offering to listen, you want to say something about it," she said.

Another heavy sigh escaped Yami.

"It was that obvious?"

"I think you know the answer to that," Anzu replied, with a shadow of a smile

Then, Yami frowned.

"Wait…how did you know--"

"She asked me, too, before class started. Remember I was up at he desk?"

Yami indeed remembered Anzu talking with Frau Mueller about something at her desk. But Yami had assumed it was homework, or something about grammar.

"But…why?"

"She's worried." Anzu replied simply, as though it was the most obvious thing in the world.

And to others, it may have been. But for some reason, someone wanting to know what was going on hadn't even occurred to Yami, before Frau had said anything. He figured everyone was too busy either with their own lives or with not liking him at the moment that they didn't really have time to think about his problems. And now here Anzu was, trying to get it out of him.

"And so am I," she said, "I know I haven't known you for that long, but I haven't seen you this agitated...ever. And you seem like you want to talk about it."

Yami was silent. He _did_ want to talk about it…he just wished sometimes he wasn't so damn obvious. But there was nothing he could do about it now…he may as well.

"For one thing, I'm failing math," he said, starting towards his locker at a more leisurely pace. Anzu followed along, listening. "Even though that doesn't have to do with anything…"

"I could help you with that."

"…no, I'll do the tutoring thing Mrs.. Robertson wants me to do…anyway, it's not important."

Thankfully, Yami's locker was close to Frau Mueller's room, and by this point they had reached it. Yami quickly did the combination, and opened it.

"What is important is the fact that I'm screwed."

"…How?"

"Think about it," Yami said, head hidden from Anzu by the locker door, as e wrestled his things out of it, "Even though I have this curse hanging over my head wherever I go, and there's nothing I can do about it because it's a curse—not really something that breaks easily, or, in this case, at all—I'm still worrying about it like it's a problem that needs to be solved, instead of something I just have to deal with, and I don't know why, which is stupid, because I should know what I'm thinking, because I'm thinking it, but I'm not really thinking at all, I'm just kind of letting things fly through my mind because I'm panicking—"

Yami took a breath, and slammed the door shut with a little more force than he intended.

"kind of like I'm doing now."

He slung his backpack on, and his basketball bag over one shoulder, then started to walk in the direction of the gym, Anzu following silently.

"And panicking isn't really a good thing to do, but of course _I_ never listen to that because I'm too busy panicking in the first place. So then, I come home from detention, where Yugi basically told me to screw off and leave him alone right in front of Joey, who we all know has been beating Yugi up for the past—not a good think at all, even if Joey can't understand half of what goes on around him, and coming from me that's a _lot _he's missing—and everyone is talking about Dalton and that whole fiasco, which they still haven't dropped, even though it's been three fucking years already—three years! And they're still not believeing it wasn't an affair! We didn't do anything! And believe me, if anyone would know, it would be the person involved! So they're talking about that, I walk in, they start snapping at me about it, I snap back, then Dad starts giving me the whole 'ancient Egyptian line' kick which he knows is the lecture I could recite while blindfolded and earplugged if I had to, but he's giving it to me anyway, and then we start arguing about how I have to marry, and all that crap, even though I don't' want to because I'm gay and that's not fair to the bride even if she does know about it which would really freak anyone out who wasn't related to the family and there _no way_ I'm marrying a cousin, even if it's a man!"

Yami paused to take another deep breath.

"So we're yelling back and forth, I'm telling him it's sick, he's telling me I'm just going to kill myself if I refuse, which is kind of true, but it's a really nasty way of putting it, when you think about it, I mean, a demon from another dimension eating your soul is just creepy in itself but it's the strangest form of committing suicide I've ever run into in my life, and that's saying a lot, considering I hang out with Bakura too much, except not now, because he goes to Dalton, and I haven't seen him since I left, and I don't know why he hasn't called, he's usually more social than I am, and it's really confusing, especially to me, even though Jim said I made more sense than Joey and Honda did, which was really weird—I'm not even making sense right now! Although I don't know why it's bothering me, because he's not really that much of a friend, he'd just kind of there, and I don't really know what side he's on anyway—"

Yami paused again, and took in his surroundings.

"—and that didn't make any sense, but here we are at the gym."

And sure enough, Coach's yells could be heard from the door; they were already warming up.

Anzu, meanwhile, seemed slightly overwhelmed; her eyes were wider than usual, and she looked extremely surprised.

"Anzu?" Yami asked, waving a hand in front of her face. She blinked, and shook her head.

"Sorry, It's just…wow…"

"…Yeah, it kind of got like that. Don't know how, but it did."

There was a long silence. Yami didn't know why that was, either. Had he just fried Anzu's brain with too much information? Did she not know what to say? Of course she didn't—he had just started talking a mile a minute with no warning. And that wasn't something he'd done in a long time…

"So, um…" he said, in a last ditch effort to break the silence. He looked toward the gym again, where he could see his teammates flashing by.

"There a game this Friday," he stated. Then he blinked.

Why on earth had he said _that_?

"Really?" Anzu replied.

"Yeah," Yami said, still confused by himself, "I forget what time it is, though."

"I think it's at five," she said. Yami blinked, and looked to her.

"…How—"

"There's a schedule over there," she said, nodding toward the myriad of papers over the gym door.

"…oh."

"There you are!"

Yami blinked, and turned to see Jim standing in the doorway.

"You'd better get in here before Coach sees you," his eyes flicked over to Anzu. "He wouldn't like your reason for being late."

Yami looked back to Anzu, confused. Anzu just shifted her books from one arm to the other.

"I'll leave, then," she said to Yami. "I need to get home anyway."

"Yeah," Yami agreed—even though he had no idea why he would need to agree with Anzu on why she had to get home. Still, he said,  
"thanks for listening, by the way."

"You're welcome," Anzu replied, smiling, "Although I think you should do it more often—you might make sense."

Yami laughed a little, at that. Then, without a further word, he went to the locker room to get ready for practice.

* * *

There were many reasons, especially today, why he was thankful for being on the basketball team. For one thing, it was the sport that came most easily to him, and he was soon known for his performance on the court. By the sound of it, Domino's team had been a little more than average up to this point, but not the best of the best. Now, they were climbing the ladder, which was psyching out everyone else on the team.

For another thing, Yami didn't really care whether he won or lost. And that took a lot of stress that he would have been playing with out of the equation. The way he saw it, he tried to work with everyone as much as he could, and if they all won, they won, but if they didn't, there was always a next time.

And for a third thing, the only reason why he was good was because he'd spent countless hours playing with Bakura, Malik, and all their friends at Dalton after school, when they had the chance. They would play in whatever conditions the weather decided to give them, all year round. Sometimes the games would be fast, sometimes they would be violent, and other days, just dribbling, as they all talked about random things that came to mind. And so, whenever Yami held the ball in his hands, he thought of friends and cold days and rain, and all the different kinds of sounds one could make just by letting the ball drop to the pavement.

It was comforting.

And today, especially, was a day when he needed it.

Needless to say, despite his being late, it was a good practice. Even if Jim was getting annoying, with his hints that Yami and Anzu were going to be a thing, soon.

Whatever. He'd worry about it another time.

Yami walked home in the crisp autumn day feeling in high spirits. Granted, they were slowly sinking, as things started coming back to him…

Crap.

His mood was declining again.

Was it ever going to end?

…No sooner had though the question that he spotted a person standing under a large tree in the park behind Domino High, right next to the sidewalk. He (it was too tall to be a she, Yami could deduce that much from his distance) was wearing Domino's uniform, which Yami thought odd; everyone was usually home by now…he wondered who it was.

As he got closer, he realized the student had brown hair. And he was smoking.

A pang of recognition hit him, and it sent his mood plummeting to the bottom of the earth, it felt like. Now he wished he hadn't recognized him. He wished he had gone the other way home. He wished the tree would fall over on the guy, and squish him out of Yami's existence.

He was walking closer. Yami stared straight ahead to the end of the block, eyes not budging from the third stripe down on the stop sign there—

"Yami," Kaiba said, before putting his cigarette to his mouth. Yami stopped, right next to the tree he was leaning on. So he had seen him. _Great…_

"Kaiba," he said stiffly.

There was a silence as they stood, looking at each other.

"I see you've taken up your Father's habit," Yami stated. Kaiba blew the smoke into the wind.

"What about it?"

Yami just rolled his eyes. Jerk.

"I saw that," Kaiba said.

"So sue me."

"You'd lose."

"Whatever." Yami growled. Kaiba laughed softly, and blew some smoke in Yami's direction. Yami blinked, trying not to choke too much at the smell—though his expression did turn very sour. After all, it had been a while since he had encountered such concentrated doses of smoke full blast, like that..

"What?" Kaiba asked, smirking, "Something wrong?"

Yami just started to walk on. Not that it had ever stopped Kaiba before, but Yami felt like keeping his mouth shut around him was the best thing he could do at the moment.. Of _all _the days…

"I asked you a question," he stated.

Yami turned around slowly, positive that at least half of the glare he wanted to give Kaiba was pouring forth from his being.

"I hardly think you need an answer."

"It'd be nice if you gave me one," Kaiba replied.

"Guess, if you're dying to know—I'm sorry to say I don't feel like spilling my heart out to you right now." Yami spat.

Kaiba raised an eyebrow.

"All right…" He said. He shoved his cigarette against the tree behind him and pushed himself off it in one fluid motion, ending up a few steps closer to the sidewalk—and to Yami.

"You're pissed that I mention your pathetic little secret on my first day, and even more so when I made fun of it. You're thrown as to why I'm even here, and frankly, you just don't want to deal with me. You're probably still sore about Dalton. And your parents have probably called everyone up to deliver the news. I'm surprised there aren't some kind of secret agents that are keeping watch on me."

And, much as Yami didn't want to respond, as he knew it would only lead to either a fight or insults or whatever else Kaiba had up his sleeve, his mouth started moving without his consent anyway. Unsurprisingly.

"First of all, it'd take a lot of explaining if we were going to hire someone to follow you. And if you think that the only thing that goes on in my life is what you do to it, then you're a lot more dense than I ever thought you could lower yourself to."

"In other words, there are other things to freak out over, right now," Kaiba translated.

The mere thought that any of what had been going on could be considered worthy of as trivial a phrase as 'freak out over' made Yami's blood boil.

"If what you mean by that is 'things that actually matter', then yes, I have a lot of things to think about. And standing here isn't making anything better."

"Neither is freaking out about them."

"And what makes you think I was asking you?" Yami spat.

"Nothing. I'm telling you."

"Why would you care? I thought you'd enjoy it if I gave myself an early heart attack."

"And much as the idea is entertaining, I'm still human enough not to wish that on people."

"How kind," Yami replied flatly, "But if I ever want your advice, I'll ask for it."

"But that's the problem."

Kaiba's sentence made Yami pause in his second attempt to walk away, and eye Kaiba warily.

"Why is that a problem?"

"Because you'll never ask me. And I have a few things to tell you that you might want to know."

"Well, you can keep them to yourself, because I _know_ there's going to be something I have to do to get you to tell me."

Kaiba rolled his eyes, letting out an annoyed sigh.

"And when have I ever done that?"

"It's something you _would_ do."

"And how would _you_ know what _I _would do?"

"I got a pretty good taste of it at Dalton!" Yami snapped, "And if you're here to try and clear your record, just piss off now!"

"I'm not here to clear a record, I'm here to tell you something, you idiot! Listen for once, instead of telling me what I'm going to do to you!"

"I don't _want_ to listen to what you have to say!" Yami shouted back, surprised that Kaiba had resorted to raising his voice—something he rarely did at all.

"And why not?"

"Because every time I do, it ends up being a bunch of shit you threw at me to confuse the hell out of me that really means nothing at all! I'm not going to do it anymore!"

"Name something!" Kaiba shot back, "Name _one thing_ I have told you this year that was shit to mess with your head!"

Yami paused, trying to think of a good example. It was hard, considering he had to think back a ways to when Kaiba was actually talking to him.

"Dalton's mark," he finally stated. "What the _hell_ did you mean by that?"

Kaiba raised an eyebrow.

"You have to think back that far to think of something?"

"Why? You've got something a little more up to date?"

"No," Kaiba stated, his voice returning to its normal volume, "And that's my point."

There was another pause, as Yami tried to figure out where exactly Kaiba was taking this.

"…And what point is that?"

"That the only reason you're overly paranoid of me is because of something I said once three years ago."

"Something you—!" Yami couldn't even finish his sentence, he was so appalled at Kaiba's wording, "And I suppose death threats just come to you on a regular basis!"

"That's what I wanted to tell you about," Kaiba stated.

"What, are you going to tell me you've come up with a better way than you gave me before! I'm sorry, but I've had enough!" And with that, Yami tried to turn around and leave. He knew he shouldn't have opened his mouth, he knew he shouldn't have—

A hand fell onto his shoulder, stopping him from walking away.

"Firstly," Kaiba said from behind him, "I didn't tell you how I was going to do it. Secondly, I don't think there could be any improvements made on an ancient curse. Usually those things are set in stone—literally. And thirdly, I don't even know how."

Yami froze, at those last words. He turned around slowly to face Kaiba again, still wondering if he heard right.

"…_What _did you say?"

Kaiba crossed his arms, and announced to the street next to them,

"What I told you freshman year, at Dalton, was a lie. I don't know how to even control the curse, let alone awaken it and make it kill you."

He turned back to Yami, and waited for some sort of reaction.

It didn't come.

"…Yami?" Kaiba asked after a minute, as Yami was still staring incredulously at him.

"_WHAT!"_ Yami shouted, making Kaiba jump back a fair distance.

"You're trying to tell me that—you—you—_HOLY SHIT_, Kaiba! I'VE BEEN WALKING AROUND FOR THREE YEARS OF MY LIFE THINKING I WAS GOING TO GET BURNED TO DEATH NEXT TIME I SAW YOU! MY WHOLE FAMILY HAS BEEN WAITING FOR IT! _THREE FUCKING YEARS!_ AND NOW YOU HAVE THE AUDACITY TO COME HERE AND TELL ME IT WAS ALL A _LIE_!"

"Consider yourself lucky that I told you!" Kaiba shot back, managing something around a glare; he looked a little too shaken to pull it off, but Yami considered that a success.

And just to make sure Kaiba really understood just how livid he was, Yami stalked over to where he was standing and gave him the meanest punch across the jaw he could muster up, at the moment.

Kaiba fell over onto the grass.

"HEY!" he yelled.

"_That's_ for not telling me before!" Yami said, as Kaiba made an attempt to get up.

"And _that_," Yami hit Kaiba across the side of the head with his stronger arm, causing Kaiba to fall over again, "is for threatening me in the _first_ place! Why the _hell_ did you do that, anyway?"

Kaiba sat up again, looking a little dazed.

"_Tell me!_" Yami demanded.

"How else would you have stopped bugging me?" Kaiba asked. "You weren't leaving me alone, and I wanted to be, so I threw out the first threat that came to mind. Yes, it was stupid, but I figured I should tell you before I have someone come after me for it."

He was flat on the grass again before he could say anything more.

"Stop punching me!"

"So you just wanted me to go away! _Great plan, Kaiba!"_ Yami drawled, raising his fist when Kaiba tried to sit up again. He settled for resting on his elbows. "Would it have hurt to just say so!" Yami continued, "You don't have to be so fucking confusing all the time! You know, there are plenty of people in the world that get along just fine by being blunt!"

"Like you?" Kaiba asked..

"_What are you implying!_" Yami hissed.

"If it means I'll get punched again, nothing."

"You—!"

"Ow! That was my side!"

"I know it was your side! Feel damn lucky is wasn't your head again!"

"Goddammit, Yami! No wonder people avoid you! If this is what you give everyone when they tell you something, I'm surprised you have any friends at all!"

That earned another kick in the side.

"Ow!"

"Is there anything else you want to insult me about? Or shall I leave you to bleed in peace?"

"Bleed?" Kaiba asked.

"Your lip," Yami explained. Kaiba's hand shot up to his lip, where sure enough, a little trickle of blood was starting to make its way down his chin. He looked up at Yami, a dangerous glint in his eye.

"That's it."

And in another swift movement, that same arm had swung behind Yami's knees, sending him sprawling onto the grass a ways from Kaiba.

"You—!"

In the ensuing scuffle, both parties got very battered in the head, and Kaiba got many more kicks in shins, this time, as Yami couldn't knock him off his feet again. He did, however, open up the gash in Kaiba's lip a little more with another punch to the face, and Kaiba managed to nail him in the eye quite hard, as well as in the stomach a fair few times.

And when they were both sufficiently beaten, Kaiba wiped the excess blood off his face with the back of his hand, and stated,

"I'm still trying to decide whether you're fighting like a man or a girl. Seriously."

"Serious, my ass! What kind of comment is that!"

"It's an observation, not a comment, idiot," Kaiba shot back, "And it's really weird...like you're somewhere in between…"

"What!"

"Must be the gay thing," Kaiba muttered—although his mutter was somewhat obscured by his bloody lip, and it ended up being louder than he meant.

"Ow!" he said, as Yami kicked him in the shin.

"At least I don't screw with people's heads when I want them to piss off!"

"Are you referring to Dalton?"

"What else!"

"Just wondering. Because it seems to me that you're being a bit hypocritical."

"What the fuck are you talking about!"

"_You're_ going to lie the rest of your life."

It took a few moments for Yami to realize that Kaiba was referring, once again, to his sexuality. But when he did, he felt another wave of anger shoot through him.

"_That_," he hissed darkly, "Is _none_ of your fucking business!"

"You're going to save the world by ruining your own." Kaiba continued, as though Yami hadn't spoken.

"Fuck off!"

"Going to shut up and pass it on, just like every single person before you—"

Yami punched him in the jaw again.

"I said, '_Fuck off_'!" he repeated, enunciating his words so clearly Kaiba couldn't miss them, even if he tried to.

But Kaiba just shook it off, crossed his arms, and continued,

"You know _why_, Yami?"

"Why what?" Yami spat.

"Do you know why it's been passed on for so long?"

"Oh, for—" Yami turned around, and started walking away. He didn't need to hear whatever shit Kaiba was going to try to feed him _now_. And now he was sporting a black eye on top of _everything_ else…

"Because it's _easier_ that way," Kaiba said from behind him, raising his voice for Yami to hear. Yami stopped abruptly, and turned around again.

"_Easier!_ What the—"

"You realize that pharaoh could have stopped it all before it even began, don't you?" Kaiba stated, covering the distance Yami had walked so he was glaring Yami in the eye again. "He could have avoided the whole thing. But, he decided to take the blame off himself and throw it onto his daughter, and everyone else after her. You know the story."

"And what's your point?"

"My point is that you've been cursed by a selfish pharaoh. And if I were you, I wouldn't tolerate that."

Yami just rolled his eyes. He didn't know what Kaiba was up to, but it was annoying the hell out of him.

"It's not that fucking easy," he said, giving Kaiba another glare, "If it were, his daughter would have taken care of the whole thing forever ago. It's kind of late now."

"Not necessarily."

Yami's glare turned into a confused stare.

"…What the _hell_ do you mean by that?"

"What I said. Use your brain."

That earned a fist in the arm.

"What was that for!"

"For implying that this is just some logic puzzle! _I am cursed_!" Yami yelled, jabbing at his chest for emphasis, "There _is_ no way out of it! Whatever logic there is has already been tried! You think my family has been sitting around crying for the past three thousand years? No! They've been trying to get themselves out of it! And I think we can tell how successful _they_ were! Not everything in life is a game to win, Kaiba! Some things you just have to swallow and live with! And _this_," Yami pulled the chain out from under his collar, "Is one of them!"

Kaiba opened his mouth to say something.

"And besides," Yami added, glaring coldly at Kaiba before he could get what he was going to say out, "I wouldn't be ruining anything by marrying a girl. I'd be _fixing_ myself, wouldn't I?"

Kaiba shut his mouth again, and seemed to freeze for a moment. He hadn't been expecting that.

"And maybe the pharaoh _was_ selfish," Yami continued, "Maybe he solved the problem the hardest way. But he's dead and gone now, so there's really nothing I can do about it."

Kaiba regarded Yami for a moment. Then he shook his head.

"And here I was, thinking you had a spine."

Immediately, Yami felt his anger take another shot upwards, and he took a step forward, ready to strike again.

"_What_!"

"You heard me," Kaiba said, tilting his bloodstained chin in a silent challenge. "I don't need to say it again. And if you actually used your brain, maybe you could figure out a way around it."

"It's _not that_—"

"_I_ can figure out ways around it," Kaiba interrupted, "Especially where passing it on is concerned."

"…What!"

"—But, of course, what do I know?" Kaiba continued, his tone turning sarcastic, "I'm the enemy—you shouldn't even be listening to me. I'm probably just messing with your head so you'll be confused for the next couple of weeks."

Yami was silent.

"I think I've succeeded, too," Kaiba said flatly, raising an eyebrow at Yami's expression.

And with that, he uncrossed his arms, stepped over the mound that was Yami's backpack and gym bag in the middle of the sidewalk, where it had been shed before their fight, and walked off down the rest of the block without a backward glance.

And Yami just stood there, not really sure what to think at all.

* * *

A/N: hrmm…so what side is Kaiba REALLY on, we all wonder? Why is he being so mysterious? What are his motives, exactly? And why on earth did Tremp make him smoke?

I'll let you ponder those questions, for a while.

Review responses!

And I just want to take a moment to do a general thank you, for everyone that's reading this, even if you don't review—now that the hits stat is up on the stats page, I can see that 606 hits have been made since the function was put up.

To all 606 of you:

THANK YOU.

You've made a writer very happy.


	20. Let Him?

A/N: Okay. A couple of things before we start.

Firstly, if you haven't visited my bio page and you're wondering where the fic "Color me Clear" went, you are not hallucinating; it was deleted from this account, because it was classified as a songfic by the administrators.

In response to this deletion, I have now created a Livejournal account under the same name that I carry here, on this site. It is acting as an archive of all of my fanfiction to date, and will be updated as often as I think of something to write. The account is completely open to all, so you can see anything that I have posted there, and comment on it as well; anonymous posts are allowed, although I would like it if you left some kind of name (preferably the one you use here, if you've reviewed on one of my stories before), so I can respond to your review next chapter. Plus, it's just nice to know who's talking to me.

And since there is no "author alert" on LiveJournal, I will post in author's notes in this story any updates that I have made to Color Me Clear, as well as on my bio page, if you insist on not keeping up with this story and ONLY Color Me Clear. (hey, you're reading _something_ of mine. I'm not complaining.)

And if you do not know how to get to LiveJournal, there is a link listed as my homepage that will take you straight to a listing of all my posts so far by title. Or you can just google it. It's not hard to find.

So that's that. Now…Chapter twenty of Doors Through Walls! A chapter I had much fun with—especially our new character! Hee hee hee…

Chapter title: Let Him?

* * *

Yami slammed the door shut more loudly than he intended, and had the vague thought that whoever tried to open it next might not be able to get it open at all. Maybe they should start keeping a crowbar by the front door…

"Yami?"

Yami turned to see Mom, staring at Yami in utter surprise. Yami just let his basketball bag fall to the floor beside him.

"Kaiba," Was all he said.

Mom's eyes widened even further. And in the silence, Gramma came shuffling in from the living room. She paused, took in Yami's black eye and grass stains, then sighed in that disapproving way so characteristic of Dad.

Guess Yami had figured out where Dad had gotten _that_ from.. Not that it helped anything—if it made any change, it got Dad's attention.

"What's going on?" Yami heard his voice ask from the living room.

"I think you'd better come out here, Amir," Mom said.

"Your son is being stupid again," Grandma added.

Yami was tempted to say 'thanks', but he didn't want another black eye—and he knew that he'd at least get one figuratively from Mom or Dad, deepening on who was closest, if he uttered the remark.

They all heard Dad's chair in the living room squeak as he got up, and his footsteps out into the front hallway.

"What happen—" Dad stopped abruptly, when he saw Yami. His worried expression fell to exasperation.

"All right," he said, looking from Mom to Gramma. "So what did our stupid son do now?"

At this point Mom had gotten over her initial shock, and she crossed her arms and nodded curtly to Yami, announcing,

"According to him, Kaiba did this."

"Oh, _really_?" Dad asked. Yami could hear the rant coming in that tone…oh, he could hear it loud and clear….

"And what brought this on?" Dad asked, turning to Yami.

"He talked to me," Yami replied.

Mom's eyes narrowed in suspicion.

"And that's a reason to fight?"

"No," Yami replied, "What he said was."

"So what did he _say_, Yami?" Dad asked, his tone sharpening.

"He told me he didn't know how!" Yami snapped.

There was a silence, as the three of them just stared at Yami. Yami sighed angrily, and disentangled himself completely from the backpack so that he could use his hands while talking—something he always did when frustrated.

"Okay," he said, "Kaiba told me that he didn't know how to turn the curse onto me. He said it was something he just came up with on the spur of the moment to get rid of me, because I was bugging him too much one day at Dalton. He said he wanted to tell me before someone came after him for it. That it was stupid, and that he shouldn't have done it."

No one said a word. Yami sighed.

"I don't know why."

He looked at his shoes. It took them a while to respond; Yami had resorted to counting the stitches he could see on his tennis shoes he hadn't bothered to take off before walking home from practice.

"Well." Dad said after a while. Everyone looked to him, expecting something more, but he just shook his head, and ran a hand through his hair. "_Well_…"

Yami took this as his cue to go upstairs; he figured they would want to 'talk' about it—a.k.a. have some kind of raging fight—and he definitely didn't want to be around for that. But before he could get his gym bag off the floor, Mom asked.

"That still doesn't explain the black eye, does it?"

Yami paused.

_Crap._

Yami turned again to Mom, who was giving him that 'I know you're hiding something' look. How he _loathed_ that look…

"Well," he said, settling on the truth as he was too scrambled to think of anything else, "He was acting like I was just overreacting, and that I shouldn't have taken his words seriously in the first place. He was implying that there was no reason to get worked up about it."

"…and you lost it."

Yami rolled his eyes.

"I didn't 'lose it'," he said, "I just gave him what he had coming."

"Given who you are, Yami, I wouldn't take it upon myself to 'give him what he had coming'," Dad said, as he came to stand behind Mom.

"Well, I did." Yami stated. At this point, he didn't really care that he was cursed. He didn't need Mom and Dad hashing over it with him, telling what he did wrong…he just needed some sleep, and for no one to bother him while he got it.

"Yami."

Yami stopped in his second attempt to get up the stairs, and looked to Dad.

"What?" he asked.

"You're not going to take that tone with us, or that attitude. You are going to tell us what happened, and what he said."

"I already did," Yami snapped.

"What did I say about tone?" Dad snapped back.

"I heard what you said!" Yami retorted, his voice rising, "Can I please just go to bed? I didn't get any sleep last night—"

"We need to know what happened with Kaiba _now_," Dad interrupted. "This can't wait until this evening."

"I already told you everything," Yami said. _Everything he was willing to, anyway…_

"So Kaiba just came up to you in between classes, told you he doesn't know anything, and you guys started punching each other?"

"_No_," Yami said, resisting the urge to glare at Mom. Instead, he just closed his eyes, and took a calming breath before opening them again, "It was after school, and he was out behind the school. He saw me, stopped me—"

"Why didn't you just keep walking?" Dad interjected.

"_Because he kept talking anyway_," Yami said, through gritted teeth. He could feel the migraine coming on…he could feel everything just start to go haywire on him…including his patience. _Especially_ his patience, now that he thought about it…

"Then, he told me he needed to tell me something, and I didn't want to listen, but he just said it anyway. He told me that he doesn't know how to lift the curse, and he never did. I was just bugging him too much, freshmen year, and he didn't know how else to get rid of me. I got pissed at him because he lied, and because he was acting like it was just a misunderstanding, and nothing to worry about in the first place. I punched him, he punched me, whatever. He told me I fight like a girl, we fought some more, we left. That was it."

"But…_why_?" Mom asked to no one in particular, frowning in confusion, "Why would he suddenly tell you he didn't know how?"

"He said that he didn't want people coming after him for it." Yami replied, rubbing his temple, which had suddenly flared up in pain, "I don't know why he was concerned about it all the sudden, but he was."

"There's got to be a catch somewhere," Mom said.

"I don't know…" Dad said.

"I think he's trying to put Yami off-guard," Grandma said.

"But why would he want to do that? Yami already knows who he is, that's no surprise," Dad replied.

"Maybe he's not who Yami thinks, though," Mom said. "It could be that he's not—"

"Of course he is! We know his family is, and every one of his relatives has aggravated ours in one way, or another. It _has_ to be…"

"We've never known for a fact," Mom pointed out, "It could be that he just knows about it—"

"Okay, would the real family tell him about it, then?" Dad asked.

"That is the family," Grandma said, "I knew Kaiba's grandfather well, unfortunately."

"Maybe it's some kind of trap?" Mom asked.

"He would just be trying to get Yami's guard down, though; why would he go to that trouble when Yami already knows to be suspicious around him?"

"Or do you?" Mom asked, turning to Yami.

"Yes," Yami replied tiredly, eyes still closed. He felt like he could fall asleep on the spot…

"Are you sure there was nothing else to the conversation?" Mom pried, "_Nothing _else? You don't remember anything else?"

"Yes," Yami replied again, in the same tone.

"Maybe he was being serious, then…" Dad said.

"But _why_ would he be serious?" Mom countered. "He would only be serious if he were trying to change his ways…"

"Didn't his father say something about that?" Grandma asked, looking to Dad.

"Yes," Dad replied, "He wasn't serious about it, though…"

"But how do we know that?" Mom asked.

"Because he just went against his word, anyway," Dad replied. "He'd say one thing one minute, then do just the opposite. He was a hypocrite."

"So maybe that's what Kaiba's doing. After all, like father like son…" Grandma said.

"Are you _sure_—" Mom started again, but Yami cut her off before she could ask the whole question.

"YES!" he shouted, silencing everyone, "And I don't really care at this point anyway!".

"Yami!" Mom said, "If anything, you should care now more than ever! Not that you haven't been giving it thought, but you should be wondering why he's being so helpful all the sudden!"

"I AM!" Yami shouted back, "You don't think this is driving me up the wall! I don't know why, and I won't know why until Kaiba says something else! Stop asking me!"

And with that, he stormed up the stairs, shut his door, and left them to talk.

It wasn't long before he was drifting off to sleep, sprawled out on his bed where he had fallen. But not before he remembered vaguely that he should mention something about tutoring, after school, for math. Not that it would make things better, though…

The thought that everything seemed to be making things worse nowadays didn't help much, either. But soon, Yami was in too deep a sleep to care about anything more.

* * *

The next few days were relatively quiet, for Yami. He and Anzu went back to talking about the mundane things in life, and nothing more was said about the necklace. Yami didn't hear a word from Yugi at all, save for an answering of a question in class—and the question was always answered in a strange voice that Yami didn't immediately recognize as Yugi's at all. But he didn't ask about it, much as he wanted to. Joey and Honda kept themselves at a polite distance from Yami, as though they were merely classmates that shared the same gym class (and in Yami's opinion, that's how it should have been from the start), and Kaiba was as silent as ever.

And try as he might to act like he didn't care, not having anyone to talk to made Yami feel somewhat deserted. Sure, Anzu conversed with him, but nowadays…it was _only _her. Even though things weren't going well before, at least Yami felt like he was doing something about it…now, it felt like he was just letting things slip.

The feeling ate at him all Saturday morning. Mom and Dad didn't bother him, as he had told them he was doing homework. Although honestly, he stared at it more than he actually did it. There were so many things to be thinking about instead of homework…like Kaiba's offer of advice.

Why had he given it to him? Why had Kaiba suddenly decided to tell him that? Was it true? How could he ever know? _Was _there a way to tell, with Kaiba? Would he be in the dark forever about it—

"YAMI!"

Yami jumped about three feet in his desk chair, making him and it clatter to the floor. The door opened, and Mom came into the room, asking,

"Yami? Are you all right?"

"Yeah…" Yami slowly got up again, shaking out the arm he had fallen on as he did so.

"I tried knocking, but you didn't hear me. Someone's on the phone for you."

Yami blinked.

"Really?"

"Yes, really, now come on! They've already been waiting five minutes…"

So Yami walked downstairs and into the living room, where he picked up the cordless.

"Hello?"

"Hey," said a voice on the other end of the line. "You need to talk to me."

"…why?" Yami asked, frowning. The voice sounded somewhat familiar, but he wasn't sure.

"Because I haven't seen you in forever?" the voice replied, as though 'why' were painfully obvious.

"…Bakura?" Yami guessed.

"Who _else_?"

"Oh—Hi!"

There was a pause.

"Yeah, I'm kidnapping you today," Bakura said, "You're forgetting me."

"No, it's not that, it's just…there's just a lot of things I'm thinking about."

"Like I said, you're forgetting me. Gimme your address."

Yami rolled his eyes.

"Has it occurred to you that I might be doing something else today?"

"No, because I know you. You're boring on the weekends."

"Oh, thanks."

"So come on! Go find you post-it!"

Yami heaved a dramatic sigh.

"Fine, fine…" he started to walk into the kitchen, when he heard snickering at the other end of the line. He frowned.

"Wait a minute…how did you know I hadn't memorized my address yet?"

"I didn't," Bakura said, still laughing, "That's the beauty of it."

Yami shook his head, walking the rest of the way to the fridge.

"You know me too well."

"No, I'm just gifted like that."

There was a silence, as Yami started looking through the slips of paper for the one in Dad's handwriting, with their address on it.

"Okay," Yami said, when he had found it, "This is the address—"

"Wait!" Bakura said urgently. "You have to tell me something first."

"What?"

"…_Is_ it on a post-it?"

Yami looked at the yellow piece of paper.

"Yes."

Bakura started cackling with laughter, and Yami had to hold the phone away from his ear for a few moments. Mom walked into the kitchen, saw Yami, and said,

"I thought it was Bakura. How's he doing?"

"Fine," Yami replied calmly, "He wants to hang out."

"You'll have tell me where," she said. "And you'll have to come back by six."

"Okay," Yami said. Then he asked into the phone, "Bakura?", as the laughing had turned into coughing. "Bakura!"

"What!" Bakura yelled into the phone.

"Ow, that was my ear!"

"You raised your voice first," Bakura stated calmly, after clearing his throat.

"Where are we going?"

"Oh, I don't know," Bakura said, "Say downtown, or something."

"Downtown," Yami said to Mom. Mom looked Yami in the eye.

"Is that the _only_ place you're going?"

"Yeah," Yami replied.

"Okay…if I hear you went anywhere else, this'll be the last time until Christmas. Got it?"

"Yeah," Yami replied.

"All right."

"Okay, here's the address…" Yami said to Bakura, looking at the post-it again.

It wasn't long before Bakura's car was waiting outside, and Yami was walking down the steps, yanking on a black sweatshirt for protection from the chilly fall air around him.

Bakura's car was the old Acura that used to be the family car, before they got a new one. It was a dusty blue color—perfect for hiding the years of dirt that had never gotten washed off. Bakura hadn't done much to it since he came to own it—although Yami was sure the large, hot pink stuffed bunny in the back window was a new addition. The bumper had the same stickers from when the car still belonged to Bakura's Dad, including "Visualize whirled peas", and a fish that looked like the Christian fish, but instead of the word 'truth' inside, it had the words ''N chips'.

"Come on, I'm wasting gas!" Bakura complained. Yami walked around to the other side of the car and got in.

Bakura looked pretty much the same as when Yami had left—he still had his long white hair, the eyeliner, and the decidedly feminine clothes. By the looks of it, he was actually wearing girls' jeans, at the moment.

"Where'd the bunny come from?" Yami asked.

"Valentine's day. Some jerk gave it to me, then broke up with me two days later."

"Who was it?" Yami asked.

"You remember that guy that was in our math class last year, with the glasses?"

"…Eli?"

"Yeah," Bakura said.

"Wow," Yami said, "I didn't know he was gay."

"I didn't either, until he asked me out," Bakura said. "But he was a jerk anyway, so he doesn't count."

"No, I guess he wouldn't."

"Anyway," Bakura said, as the car took off with a jerk down the street, "Where do you want to go?"

"I thought you were going to think of something," Yami replied.

"Yeah, well, I'm driving," Bakura said, "I can't do two things at once."

Yami laughed a little, suddenly.

"What?" Bakura asked.

"I'm just remembering the time you tried to put on eyeliner and drive at the same time."

"Was that the same day we were late for school?"

"There were a lot of those."

"I'm talking about when I ran over the flowers in the front."

Yami laughed outright, "Yeah, I think that was the same time."

Bakura nodded, turning onto a main road, "Good times…good times."

"So, how's everything back at Dalton?" Yami asked.

"Eh, pretty much the same. Things are quieter, now that you're gone."

"Really?"

"Yeah—there's no one to annoy."

"What about Derek?"

Bakrua's eyes narrowed, "_That_ jerk?"

"What happened?" Yami asked.

"He cheated on me, that's what."

"With who?"

"Some girl from Phillips."

"Ooh," Yami said. Phillips was the all-girls' school right down the road from Dalton. "I thought he said—"

"Yeah, I know. It was all a lie anyway," Bakura said. "But whatever."

Yami nodded silently.

Bakura had a habit of falling in and out of relationships about as often as Yami didn't get into them—which was almost never. He'd told someone to their face about the crush he'd had on them once, at Bakura's urging. But it had ended in a complete fiasco—the guy ended up being very homophobic, and had sent his friends after Yami. They hadn't been that much of a match for Yami, and soon he was left alone. It had totally killed his confidence, though, and Yami had never made an effort to try to revive it since.

"What's Domino like?" Bakura asked.

Yami heaved a long sigh, and slouched back in the car seat.

"It _was _fine…" he said.

"What happened?"

Yami paused for a moment.

"Just…lots of things."

"Well, we have time to hear about lots of things," Bakura countered, stopping the car. Yami looked out to see they were in the back parking lot of a restaurant downtown.

"…Were are we going?"

"That shake place. I have a feeling you need a shake."

Yami rolled his eyes, although he couldn't suppress a smile.

"Whatever. You just want to see who's there."

"Can you blame me for looking?" Bakura replied, grinning. Yami laughed, and opened his door to get out of the car.

"You're hopeless, you know that?"

Bakura feigned offense.

"Hopeless! Look who's talking!"

"Hey!"

"If anything," Bakura said, walking over to Yami's side, "_You're_ the one that needs a date."

"What—?"

"So you can be mine for the day!" And with that he linked Yami's arm in his own. Yami just laughed, as they made their way to the front of the restaurant—which, Yami realized, was the same one he had seen Anzu at, after he and Yugi had gone to the library. Except now, Yami and Bakura were heading inside, instead of sitting in a table out on the sidewalk.

"I only get a day?" Yami asked.

"Well, yes," Bakura said seriously, "It'd never work out; we go to different schools, and you're so romantically challenged I would get completely fed up with you. And our friendship would thus fall apart."

"Sounds tragic."

"Isn't life?"

Yami laughed again, as they went inside the restaurant.

Unfortunately, the only other people there was a group of teenage girls Yami recognized from Domino, catching up on their gossip. They all paused, however, when Yami and Bakura walked into the restaurant. After they had passed their table, arms still linked, the girls started whispering again, this time more excitedly.

When Bakura turned around to sit in the booth opposite Yami, he noticed one of the girls staring at him, almost with a glare. He gave his best smile to her, flipping his long hair a little as he sank into the booth seat.

"Bakura?" Yami asked, staring strangely at Bakura's action. Bakura giggled, a little.

"They think I'm your date," He whispered.

"That was the point wasn't it?" Yami asked, resisting the urge to look back.

"Yes, but this is _different_!"

"…how can you tell?"

"They're giving me jealous looks!" Bakura whispered, obviously extremely amused by the whole thing.

"They're _jealous_?" he asked flatly.

"Of course," Bakura replied, "Since you're _such_ a catch."

"Yeah, right."

"Oh, come on, you're handsome. You just don't want to admit it."

Thankfully, the waitress came before Yami had to respond to that comment—he didn't quite know what to say when people told him that. Granted, it was mostly Bakura, but still…some other people had told him that too, and he always just looked at them funny while he tried to get his tongue unstuck from the roof of his mouth.

Bakura struck up conversation with the waitress, when they ordered their drinks And judging by the pitch in Bakura's voice, Yami guessed he had decided to act the feminine role, while he was here.

Bakura had a habit of switching genders as often as he walked into a new room; his hair was long enough to pass for either, and he wore enough women's clothes that he could convince just about anyone. His mannerisms and tone of voice were enough for people to overlook the fact that his build was more masculine than feminine; people just took him for a very thin, very flat girl.

Yami didn't know exactly why he did it, but he knew that there were times when Bakura definitely used his talents to his advantage; if a situation would be easier on a female than a male, he would start acting so feminine no one could tell the difference between him and the next teenage girl. But if the situation would be easier for a male, then he would erase all femininity from his presence. He was almost like a chameleon, in a sense; he would change whenever he felt like he needed to.

Although in this case, Yami felt like he was only acting like a girl because he thought it was amusing. And judging by his snickering after the woman had left, Yami was right.

"Having fun?" he asked.

"You should try it sometime," Bakura said, "It really is fun. But not right now, everyone thinks you're my hot date."

Yami rolled his eyes.

"Whatever. Besides, I'd suck at it. Even if I wanted to try."

"You're just scared to."

"No, I think I mean it this time."

Bakura eyed Yami for a moment.

"You're really stressed." He stated. Yami turned to him again.

"Huh?"

"You're snapping at me, and you're staring out the window looking all sad and depressed. And with all that black, you look like a Goth."

Yami blinked, and looked down at himself. Sure enough, he had slipped on his black uniform shoes because they were closest, he was wearing tight black pants with unnecessary belts and rings all the way up the sides, his black studded belts he wore all the time, a black t-shirt he had gotten in middle school saying, "keep staring, I might do a trick", and his black sweatshirt.

"…oh."

"So," Bakura said, leaning on the table, "what's been going on?"

Yami heaved another one of his long sighs.

"I know _that _part," Bakura said.

"I said it anyway." Yami replied.

There was a silence, as Yami stared out the window again. Bakura slapped Yami on the hand.

"Ow."

"You're telling me your troubles," he stated.

"Oh, yeah," Yami replied, then turned to Bakura. "Well, " he started, "First of all, there's this guy—"

"ooh!" Bakura's eyes lit up. Yami raised an eyebrow.

"Not that kind. He's straight."

"Oh."

"Anyway," Yami continued, "When I first went to Domino, he was my partner for this project we were doing in World History, for our final…which we still need to work on…but anyway. I decided to make friends with him, because hey, may as well start out on the right foot. Turns out he was the school scapegoat, everyone sought out to pick on him, and the worst offender was the friendly guy in my gym class."

"Let me guess the next part," Bakura said, holding up a hand, "You decide to stand up for him, beat the gym guy up, and get in trouble for it."

"And my World History project partner decided to tell me to stay away."

"Ah," Bakura said, nodding slowly. "So now you're feeling worthless."

"What—I'm not feeling worthless!" Yami exclaimed.

"Yes you are." Bakura stated calmly. "You're feeling like your efforts are completely blown away, and that no one cares."

Yami frowned at him.

"You sound like you've seen this before."

"Twice," Bakura said, looking Yami in the eye. "And you know it."

Yami put his chin in his hand, and didn't respond. Their shakes were given to them, and Bakura exchanged some more friendly words with the waitress. Yami just stared out the window again, and waited until he was done.

"Oh, come on," Bakura said, once the waitress was back behind the counter, "Think of it this way; one out of three worked."

Yami turned to look at him again.

"…What do you mean?"

"One out of the three people you stood up for ended up not hating you."

Yami just looked at Bakura blankly.

"Who was that?"

"Duh!" Bakura said, hitting himself in the head. The action made him look very teenage girlish indeed. "Me!"

"Oh."

"Yami, if it weren't for you, I'd still be blushing every time someone paid attention to me. And I could go on a 'then and now' kick, but I'm not going to because I'll make myself gag. You get the point."

Yami looked at Bakura for a moment, unconvinced.

"All right, fine," he said, "What about Kaiba?"

Bakura rolled his eyes.

"He's a broody bastard that'll never think of anyone but himself. I thought we agreed on this."

"You don't know what he said a couple days ago," Yami said, glaring out the window.

"Aha," Bakura said quietly, stirring his milkshake, "The root of the mood."

"…huh?" Yami asked, distracted by the strangeness of the comment.

"Oh, nothing," Bakura said, waving a hand. "But how did you two meet again? I thought he was home schooled."

"He decided to pop back into public schooling again, for the hell of it. I think he went to Domino because he thought I was at Dalton still. But he didn't say that."

"Really?" Bakura said, raising his eyebrows. Yami nodded.

"So has he been causing more chaos lately?"

"Oh, yes," Yami said, taking a sip of his shake. "He's been doing the whole, 'I'm going to tell everyone about your sexuality' thing."

"Sounds like him. Especially since you didn't want people to know. Why _didn't _you want people to know, anyway?"

"It's…a long story," Yami said, looking away again.

"That's what you say every time," Bakura pointed out.

"I mean it," Yami replied. "It's not worth knowing, really."

"If it weren't worth knowing, you would have told me," Bakura said. Yami shook his head.

"Anyway," he said, "so he was doing the whole 'I'm going to tell everyone' thing, and he starts talking about 'Dalton's mark'."

"Bullshit," Bakura said.

"You know what it means?"

"He's talking about your being gay, Yami. _Again_."

"…oh. But…that doesn't make sense."

"No, it doesn't," Bakura agreed, "Everyone knows we're the odd ones out anyway. I can now say I've dated all the willing men at Dalton, and it didn't even take me a year."

"Really?' Yami asked.

"Yes," Bakura replied, looking somewhat miffed, "Out of a school of 500, only around 20 are openly gay. Over ten of which I had to ask out myself. All of whom are jerks. And according to my math, that's less than half a percent of the school."

"…Wow." Yami said.

"It's not 'wow'," Bakura replied, "It's depressing."

"…You don't have to be going out with someone, you know," Yami pointed out.

"Yes, I know," Bakura said, "But it's still depressing. I can't have any fun anymore."

"What about basketball during lunch?" Yami asked, "That's fun."

Bakura looked at Yami for a moment, then started laughing.

"What?"

"You're _clueless_!" Bakura said between laughs.

"How am I—you said fun—"

"Not 'good clean fun'! Geez!" Bakura exclaimed. The girls at the table must have been looking at him again, because he flipped his hair behind his shoulder again, "When I'm talking about boys, I'm not talking about _that_ kind of fun!"

"…Oh." Yami felt himself tinge red a bit, which sent Bakura laughing again.

"You're as bad as me at age thirteen!" He managed to laugh out.

"No," Yami replied, "At age thirteen, you would have been beet red. And you would have been so horrified by your own comment that you would have been speechless for a good minute or so."

"All right, fine," Bakura said, taking a breath to calm himself again. Once he had gotten himself under control, he cleared his throat.

"So," he said, taking hold of his straw again, "About Kaiba."

"What about Kaiba?"

"He came to Domino. He must have done something other than tease you about Dalton's mark."

"At first, he was being like normal," Yami said. "But then…he just stopped talking to me altogether."

Bakura paused in his stirring of his shake again.

"Really?'

"Yeah. And you know how back at Dalton, I was really upset about that threat he told me?"

"The threat that I never heard details about?"

"…Yeah, that one. Anyway—he told me that that's all it was. He never had any intentions of carrying it out. He doesn't even know how."

"…so after about two and a half years, you find out you're not really mad about anything at all?"

"Yes," Yami said, "Exactly. Except that I don't know if he's being serious or not. It could just be he's trying to get me to let my guard down or something, but that wouldn't be a reason for…anything. Unless he's planning something, but I somehow doubt he's doing that…I could be wrong, though…"

"So, what exactly did Kaiba tell you freshman year that made you so mad in the first place?" Bakura asked.

Yami froze. He couldn't tell Bakura the real reason why—for one thing, he wouldn't believe him, and secondly, Yami would take forever to explain it. But, he couldn't think of anything else at the moment that would be believable, and the silence had already grown suspiciously between them.

"Um," Yami said, shifting in his chair, "He…threatened to, um…well, kill me, basically. And we took him seriously."

Bakura almost choked on his drink.

"_Kaiba_? Threatening to _kill_?" he coughed out.

"That's the boiled down version!" Yami said hastily, "It's a lot more complicated than that, but it'd take me forever to explain it, and—"

"Yami!" Bakura hissed, eyes flicking over to the table with the girls again, "Killing is _killing_! There's no explanation long enough for _that_!"

"Yes there is," Yami said, "And I have it."

"And I'm goingto hear it." Bakura stated, glaring at Yami.

"I can't tell you!" Yami said, keeping his voice lowered; they both knew that they had at least two parties listening to them, and they were guaranteed more ears than that.. "I just…I just can't, all right? You'll just have to trust me on this one! I'm not saying I know why Kaiba threatened me, but I know what he threatened me with exactly! I just…can't say anything…"

"No wonder your parents freaked out about that…maybe his uncle found out, and that's why he got taken out of Dalton."

"I don't know," Yami replied wearily, closing his eyes, "All I know is that, after holding this threat over my head for three years, he comes up and tells me yesterday that it didn't mean anything. 'Before someone comes after him for it', he said."

"That could mean the police," Bakura stated.

"No," Yami said, "I doubt it's them. Unless he did something I don't know about…"

"There are a lot of things you don't know about that he did," Bakura said. "Something involving the police could be one of them."

But Yami was shaking his head.

"I know it's not them, Bakura. His threat doesn't have anything to do with them."

"Oh, is this another thing you can't tell me?" Bakura snapped.

"Bakura—"

"When someone threatens to kill, they mean it! Believe me!"

"Only if you will me!" Yami hissed.

Bakura was silent. For a long time they sat there, Yami kicking himself mentally for even thinking he could bring up anything with Bakura, and Bakura fuming over what he had just learned.

Finally, after a long while, Bakura spoke.

"I don't know if this amounts to anything," he said, his tone and expression very serious, "But I don't think I've told you this. And unlike _some _people, I'm going to go ahead and tell you."

"All right," Yami said, choosing to ignore Bakura's comment on his secrecy.

"You remember the day he left, right? He just walked out."

Yami nodded.

"Well," Bakura said, "I was in the classroom when he did. I had gone up to him, and told him that you would miss him. After all, you were friends, and I didn't know about any of _this _or what you guys actually talked about when you tried to make conversation with him. All _I_ knew at that point was that even though you were mad at him, part of it was because he just cut you off for no apparent reason. So, he stood up, and said 'let him'. Then…he walked out."

Yami didn't respond right away.

He had made up a story to tell Bakura about what he and Kaiba had talked about, and in his anger at Bakura for constantly bugging him about it, and confusion at Kaiba for making that threat, he had constructed Kaiba to be a very mean person, to Bakura. In a truth that only Yami and Kaiba themselves knew, Kaiba had suddenly become withdrawn, a few weeks into the school year. Before that, he and Yami had gotten along somewhat well. After the change, Yami had wanted to know why. So he had tried to pull out of him why, and Kaiba had just ended up snapping at him. And when Yami wouldn't let up, Kaiba had threatened him with the curse. A couple days later, he had walked out of the school, and had never come back.

He had walked out, saying, 'let him'. But what did that translate into?

'Let him miss me?'

It didn't make sense.

"That's…odd…" Yami finally said, looking to Bakura again. "Really odd."

"That's what I thought," Bakura replied. "I don't know why I didn't tell you."

"Well, I know now," Yami said, "And that's what matters."

Bakura nodded slowly. He then tried to take another sip of shake, but it made that signature milkshake slurping sound, when one has reached the end of the cup. Somehow, it signified the end of their talk, as well.

Things were eerily silent on the ride back to Yami's house, Yami feeling more horrible now than he did before. And he had homework to look forward to, on top of it all…

But just as he was about to get out of the car, he heard Bakura say,

"Hey."

Yami looked to him.

"Yeah?"

"I know I never say this, but after what you told me…I have a feeling there are a lot darker things behind all this than you're giving Kaiba credit for. And you're my best friend. Just…be careful, all right? Don't pull something stupid on me."

Yami was silent for a moment, somewhat shocked; Bakura was never one to show that kind of concern. To have him say something Yami would predict Mom to say Yami wonder…if someone who didn't know anything about the curse or Kaiba's part in it was picking up on a sense of foreboding…then just how much of it was out there, surrounding Yami's life? Was it because he was in the middle that he didn't see it?

He nodded.

"I don't plan to," he said. Bakura nodded, too—a mutual agreement on the matter. Yami got out of the car.

"And by the way," Bakura added. Yami turned to see him leaning out the window. "We're going to flatten you Friday after next."

"Heh," Yami laughed, remembering the Domino vs. Dalton basketball game that was coming up. "I wouldn't count on it."

"What, your team's good?"  
"We're better than we've been in a while."

"So's Dalton."

"That's only because of Malik."

Bakura considered for a moment.

"Yeah, probably. His twin Marik's on the team, too."

"Oh, really?"  
"Yeah. They're really good this year"

"You coming to the game, then?"

"Of course," Bakura said with a grin, "_Someone_ has to yell obscene things to distract you, and I don't think anyone else is willing to do it."

"No," Yami laughed, "That's definitely your job."

"So you want me to?" Bakura asked brightly.

"Not really," Yami admitted, shaking his head. Bakura feigned disappointment.

"All right…" He sighed, dramatically, "I guess I won't."  
"I could introduce you to people I know instead," Yami offered.

Bakura straightened.

"Really?"

Yami shrugged.

"Yeah, don't see why not…you'd probably scare Joey, come to think of it. He's the guy I beat up."

"Ah," Bakura said, an evil glint suddenly shining in his eye, "I see, Yami. Are you perchance giving me a potential victim?"

"Well," Yami said, "I'm not saying that you _should _pick on him, but if you _want_ to, I wouldn't say anything."

"Ooh," Bakura said, "You'll have to point him out for me."

"I will," Yami replied.

Bakura let out en evil laugh.

"I should kidnap you more often," he said, "This was too short. But, I have to be at work in about ten minutes, so I guess it's good. I'll get money, anyway."

"Yeah," Yami agreed. "Well, if you don't kidnap me before then, then I'll see you at the game."

"Yes, you will," Bakura said. And with that, he rolled his window up, cranked up his music again, and took off down the street. Yami watched him rocket down to the end of the block, and swerve around the corner and out of sight. It took a little longer than that for the music to completely fade away.

Then, Yami took up the tiring task of convincing the front door to open for him, as he was starting to get a little chilly—and the cold shake in his stomach wasn't making him warmer…

* * *

A/N: So there you have it; my own strange version of Bakura, making his first appearance. And a little more has been revealed about that ambiguous time at Dalton. And Yami's still confused..

Yay!

Now we'll catch up with Yugi!

But first! Because you're all so wonderful for reading this…

**Yami Yuugi: **Wow, three ways it could go…that's a lot. But it'll be narrowed down in a matter of time. Hehe. I'm glad you like my looks into everyone's head—I'll have to keep that in mind, for future fics now…

**Cutehelenjames: **lol, glad you're liking it so much, and getting into it!

**Gothatheartholo: **I'm not detecting any repeating in your reviews, so don't worry about that. And Yay! People think they're IC! (dances)—that makes me very happy. And look—I introduced a Bakura, just like you said! I think it's so fun, when people guess correctly what's going to happen the next chapter; on eighteen, people were all like "Yami's mind is next, right!" and lo and behold, they were right. I didn't even plan it like that, either. I don't' know if you were one of the ones that predicted, but I'm just blabbing to you because you left a lot of things in your review for me to blab about….and I'll stop now. Heh.

**seers-of-a-lost-paradise**: Oh, yes, the humor was intended. Very much so. I'm glad you're liking this so much, at the risk of sounding like a broken record. Haha. Thanks for the good wishes on the moving; hopefully everything will go well…

**Dragon:** Hrmm, I can't tell who _you_ like to see! Lol! And yes, your question will be answered. If nothing changes from now to then, that answer will have a whole chapter to itself. If that makes you feel better, hehe.

**Towairaito Zoon:** wahaha, yes, Yami can be very dense, at points. But that's one of the entertaining qualities, I think.

**Counterspell:** Why, thank you! And yes, there will be some more Yugi in the future; next chapter, actually.

**Phoenix87:** hehe, well, you were close with the Dalton thing. They were friends, anyway. And that's good. And the ways that it can be handled will be discussed in due time, as well; after all, I can't just leave you guys hanging on that, I've led so much up to it. And thanks for the update leeway! Lol. Hope you enjoyed Chapter 20!

**Hikari Skysong:** Yes, complicated is a good word for it. I didn't mean for it to start out that way, but…one thing led to another…And I've revealed to everyone who's asked that yes, there will be a Shounen Ai pairing between these characters. The list of possibilities will narrow down, as the story goes along. Glad you're enjoying it in the meantime, though!

**Jenny C:** Thank you—although I apologize for making your head hurt. Lol,

**Blue September:** Yes, he is a bit irked at that. I'm glad you're so excited about this; though; it makes my day. Hoped you liked chapter 20!

**mechante fille:** Aww, I made someone's day! Fuzzies! Hehe…and I loved your review, it was so insightful. It brought attention to things I didn't think about before (or just didn't bring _much _thought to). And your predictions were fun to read; I can't tell you if they're true or not yet—I'll have to let the story reveal those themselves. But I thank you many times over for rewriting your review so I could hear what you said; it makes me feel very happy indeed.

**SolarCat:** lol! Well, at least you're honest. And I'm pretty sure the pairing will be apparent at the end of this fic. If not, then in the sequel that I'm planning to write. Hope the mysteriousness is keeping you occupied in the meantime!

**Padfoot13:** YAY! You reviewed! I don't remember if this is your first time or not, but thank you! I'm glad you liked chapter nineteen so much! Hope you liked twenty!

**Gylzgurl:** But I CAN count! See? One…two…four...um…oh, never mind. But I agree that you're special, hehe. In more ways than one.

**Siany:** Thank you! And there will be much more of this, so there's no need to worry about that. And no, I don't have a beta; I just kind of started writing, and this huge plot popped out of nowhere, heh. But I'll keep that in mind, to watch for the typos in the future. They kind of get away from me; I'll have to hunt for them_…(whips out net)._


	21. The Attack

A/N: So here we are again, for the long-awaited catching up with Yugi. It's been a couple months, hasn't it?

Well, you know, with college starting, I've been kinda busy.

But I didn't want to abandon you guys completely (if at all…that whole two month thing really wasn't supposed to happen, there). So, I guess that means I really can't hold the suspense any longer. Unless…

Otogi jumps out of a bush and attacks the nearest main character, blaming his actions on his tortured past that involves everyone else somehow, making things even more complicated!

Otogi: yes, Yugi; I _am_ your father!

(dramatic thunder clap, even though it's not raining)

Yugi: (stage gasp) _No!_

Haha.

…nah, that'd be too much.

I'll just stick with Yugi. He's depressing enough as it is...

Chapter title: The Attack

* * *

"_Yugi…I give you the freedom to come to me when you're feeling bad about something. Though obviously, I haven't been telling you enough; you're choking under the weight of whatever problems you have, and I don't even know what could have caused it. And now…you're so emotionally distraught that you're seeing things."_

He knew he was emotionally distraught. What else could he be? Tired was certainly out….and stress just seemed to mild a word, now.

…So why hadn't he said anything? To anyone? What made him so afraid to tell? The question filled his mind until all other thought that might distract him was chased out. But perhaps he had been distracted enough. Maybe he wanted to be distracted. Perhaps…

Yugi tightened the hold he had on his sides, much as his fingers were screaming for some circulation.

Perhaps he was afraid to think about it. To know why he himself had been so…quiet, these past years.

'These past years' meaning most of his life…

"Why are you sitting like that, Yugi?"

Yugi blinked, and turned to see Grandpa giving him a concerned look. Yugi slowly loosened his grip, and brought his hands into his lap. He shrugged.

"Don't know."

Grandpa's eyes lingered on Yugi for a moment, as they tried to decipher his response. Yugi made sure his face didn't convey anything that Grandpa could pick up on as a clue; he didn't want anyone else to know why he was doing that before he had figured it out himself. All he knew at the moment, though, was that it made his sides (and insides) feel better, somehow.

"People will come in thinking you've got a strait jacket on," Grandpa finally replied.

Yugi nodded absently, picking up his book from the countertop where he had set it in the first place, before his mind had spun off onto its tangents of thought. Grandpa went back to his straightening out the shelves.

It had been like this ever since the day after Yugi had seen the ghost, last week. The day it actually happened wasn't that bad, but when Grandpa had started prodding Yugi for some explanation as to why he might be seeing things, Yugi just shut up. Even after all that Grandpa had tried to do to get Yugi to open up, every time Yugi tried, his body would just close itself off, as though there was a defensive mechanism that triggered a complete shut down of his ability to form sentences. And if he _did _manage to get a word out, something would always distract them; someone would come into the shop, or the phone would ring, or some other sudden aspect of life. And so, Grandpa and Yugi lived in silence.

Yugi found it excruciating. Yes, there was usually barely a word spoken between them, but it was nothing like this….emptiness. Yugi felt like he was suffocating under it—and words only made it worse.

Yugi stared at the text on the page, letting it blur before him. Maybe…

He took a look breath, and sat up again, still staring at his book.

"The, um…the ghost hasn't come back," he stated.

He heard the shifting of card boxes stop for a moment.

"That's good," Grandpa said, "I'm glad to hear it."

A pause. Yugi rocked a little on his stool behind the counter, staring ahead as he willed the next few words out with a great effort.

"You know…"

"What?" Grandpa asked, after a long pause.  
"I…I think that you were right…about the stress thing…"

"Really?" Grandpa asked, as though Yugi had just told him about the weather.

Yugi nodded, and looked back down at his book.

Footsteps made their way over to the store's counter; slow, shuffling steps. Out of the corner of his eye, Yugi could see Grandpa's hands suddenly spread out on the surface. Slowly looking up, Yugi saw Grandpa giving him a serious look.

"I guess that means you need to vent."

Even stated, the sentence sounded like a plea. Yugi considered it for a moment….but that same reaction grabbed him, and wouldn't let go. Yugi struggled for a few moments, taking in yet another breath as though he were about to speak…only to let it out again in the end, and shake his head.

"No," he said.

Grandpa's face fell. He nodded slowly, then took his hands off the counter, going back to work. Yugi mentally slapped himself. Why it wasn't coming out was completely unknown to him; he thought he wanted to tell Grandpa about things. What part of him was holding back? _Why?_

"Your mother had things she wouldn't tell me," Grandpa stated, suddenly.

_Oh, great, bring the lunatic back into this,_ Yugi thought, _trying to scare me into telling you…_

On the outside, Yugi kept his eyes glued on his blurry book.

"Didn't it end up being the fact that she didn't like Dad in the first place?"

"…No, I was thinking of how she was the one that kept putting the salt and pepper in the freezer, instead of you."

Whether that was meant as a joke or not, neither of them knew. Eventually, Grandpa cleared his throat.

"But you're right, about the other secret…"

"She screamed it at the top of her lungs the night she left," Yugi said, "Don't think I'll ever forget that one."

"Yugi…"

Yugi looked up to see Grandpa giving him a sympathetic look. Not that it helped Yugi any…

"That doesn't mean she didn't care about you."

Yugi let out a laugh that was short, and cold.

"Yeah, right."

"She was your mother, Yugi. She raised you just as much as I did, when she was here."

Yugi didn't respond to that; he just sat there, letting his supreme annoyance at Grandpa's remark wash over him in increasingly stronger waves. Putting Grandpa and Mom on the same level in his mind just irked him, and he hated that Grandpa even thought of it. Nonetheless, Grandpa pressed on:

"And even though she's not here anymore, I know you still care about her—"

Yugi didn't even wait until Grandpa finished his sentence to interrupt.

"This isn't new crap she's pulling, Grandpa."

"…excuse me?" Grandpa asked, clearly startled by Yugi's words. Yugi snapped the book shut, and finally looked up at Grandpa.

"She's been pulling this kind of emotional shit since she lived here. She's really great at that whole 'let's mess up my life as much as I can' thing."

"Yugi—"

"I don't care, anymore," Yugi interrupted again, hopping off the stool he had been sitting on and getting out from behind the counter. He startled himself with his assuredness, looking Grandpa directly in the eye and stating something he thought he never would voice aloud.

"I just don't. I figured out a long time ago that it's just a waste of time, worrying about her. Honestly, I don't know why you still do."

Grandpa was silent. Yugi continued walking, going up the stairs and heading to his bedroom. He would have started to read to try to get his mind off the subject, but after looking at the time, he sighed angrily. Grabbing his World History things, he came back downstairs again.

"I'm going to the library." He stated, holding up his books as he walked by Grandpa. "Hopefully Yami and I can finish this project thing we're doing…"

"…All right," Yugi barely heard Grandpa say, before he walked out the front door to the shop, and towards the bus stop.

It was after a few moments Yugi realized that he was waiting at the school bus stop for the metro. Startled, he made his way over to the metro stop halfway down the next block, wondering why he was being so absent-minded, all the sudden. Even when he was blithering mad on the inside, he never, _never_ got confused about his outside surroundings…if anything, it was the one thing he was sure of; the fact that there would always be a door to the game shop, and that there would always be a bed labeled as his. There would always be a corner desk for him to sit in, and be silent. There would always be a hedge to block him from view of those that could help. It was just the way of things.

Although recently, things had been a little different. For a while, Yugi had actually spoken during the day. He was noticed by someone other than Joey his cronies. He talked to someone other than Grandpa and the teachers, when they asked him something. He had laughed.

Yugi rolled his eyes, letting out an angered sigh.

What a poisonous feeling, friendship. He couldn't understand why everyone scrambled for it; it seemed to screw him over in the end. And not just a little bit, either; it tore him inside out and hung him to out to drip dry under a heat lamp, with no way to get down.

He had started to feel comfortable for a while. Like he was worth something. He'd had good moods and everything. Now… his life had graduated to the next level of hell, and there was no way it was moving up again, Yugi was sure.

"_I'm not like Mom."_

"…_I can't really tell you if you are or not. Part of you is—half of who you are came from her. That's not going to change. But what half that is is not something I know. That's only something that you know, and no one else can tell you_.

Subconsciously, his hand moved to his side again.

_Well Grandpa,_ Yugi thought, _I think I've figured it out_. Sooner or later, he'd start yelling at the ghost when it didn't show up, thinking that it was there anyway. He'd sit in a corner for days, rocking back and forth…he could just see it. Maybe he'd run off to Bermuda, or something. Madagascar. Somewhere bizarre, like that. Then he'd charm some poor woman into falling in love with a personality that certainly wasn't his own, get engaged, then call Grandpa telling him what had happened over the past ten years.

…Nah.

Yugi promised himself right then that if he ever found himself in that situation, he'd shoot himself before she had fallen too hard for him. No one needed to see his wreck. No one but Yugi himself.

And that's the way it was always going to be.

Now…he just needed to wait for it to happen; for his psyche to take a leap off a cliff, leaving him with nothing to hold himself together. He'd fall apart, run away in shame, then die.

The only thing Yugi was hoping for right now was for his state to wait until he was out of High School to happen. One more year, and he could leave the sane world with at least a high school diploma to his name. It wasn't much, but it was something….

He wondered what it felt like, to go insane. Did you realize it, or did you just…start doing things? Did you remember what you did?

"_People end up the way they are for a reason."_

What, did God hate him or something? This was assuming there was one…he'd never been brought up to believe either way, and sometimes he'd like to think there was one. But that didn't change the fact that he had never really believed one was actually there…

The bus must have come, and Yugi must have gotten onto it; he suddenly bumped into someone—and then he realized he was two stops away from where he should have been.

"_You're not taking it well," Grandpa pried._

Yugi shook his head, got off, and focused on tracing the bus route back to his intended stop.

At least the bruises were getting better now; where that lady had bumped him was pretty tender that first day. Yugi didn't know how many days it had taken—he wasn't really paying attention to things like that, anyway—but he knew that he was feeling less pain.

One the outside, anyway…

At that thought, Yugi mentally slapped himself Now he just sounded like one of those depressing scene songs that came on the radio from time to time, that made suicide an art.

Maybe someone would write one about him and become famous. He had enough emotional shit to make it to the top, he was sure. Compared to what he knew about some up there now.

Not that it mattered. Someone would have to actually realize he existed, for that to happen. Someone who didn't want to 'save' him via friendship, or some shit like that. He swore, if he heard that word spoken one more time…

"_You're not very trusting, are you?"_

"_Not really."_

_A silence._

"_Anyway…I guess… I'll make an exception."_

What a dolt.

_You, Yugi, _he thought,_ are the most stupid, trusting dolt known to mankind._

What made him cringe even more was the thing that had led Yugi to say that in the first place;

"_And if you haven't noticed, I don't really care about what other people think. I'm not going to throw away a friendship for people I don't know."_

…Well, Yugi thought it was safe to say that he wasn't going to fall for _that_ one again.

God, this sounded like some kind of relationship gone down the toilet. Next he'd be writing poetry, right?

Yugi let out another cold laugh; he wasn't even good enough for _that_. No one, he was sure, would ever see him like that.

All he got out of life was a stupid dingbat who had tried to get Yugi on the friendship wagon, gawking as Yugi got caught in the wheel wells underneath.

Shaking his head, Yugi realized he was about two blocks from the library. He needed to stop this getting lost in his thoughts thing…it was starting to creep him out. Still, Yugi straightened, and faced the crosswalk.

Time to do business.

The whole conversation that had brought Yugi here in the first place came to mind; very formal and very short, consisting of Yami just asking him if he had time to go to the library that day and finish the project. They didn't have much left to do; some research between them and some written work at home would see it done.

The part Yugi didn't want to think about was how he had taken it upon himself to do most of the research on his own, after detention last Thursday. He had gotten a lot more done than either of them did during their study time together, too.

But now, it would all be done. And after that… he was back at square one.

Square one, where he could die inside, and no one would notice. Where he could know everything about the mundane lives of those around him, but no one could ever know about his.

Ah, there was the idiot now. Yugi recognized his hair from here. He looked unhappy.

What, was the awkwardness too much for him to handle? Could he not keep a decent front when talking to someone he wasn't buddy-buddy with, anymore?

Determinedly, Yugi kept his face blank, as Yami came up to him. They met right across the street from the library, and for a moment they just stood there, silent. Yugi looked at Yami with his blank expression. Yami looked at a point somewhere off in the distance, hand at his neck. But he wasn't fiddling with his necklace. Wasn't that a first.

"Well," Yami finally said, "Let's get this done."

Yugi simply gave a nod.

While they were waiting for the light to change at the crosswalk, though, Yami suddenly shivered beside him, and he pulled his jacket around him. Yugi looked to him questioningly; it wasn't _that_ cold…

"Do not blame me for this, whatever it is ending up being."

Yugi frowned. What kind of comment was that?

"…What do you mean?" he asked. Yami looked down at him, arms wrapped around his middle.

"Huh?"

"What would I blame you for?"  
"…what?" Yami asked, looking severely confused.

"You told me not to blame me for whatever this ends up being."

"Um…I didn't say anything…" Yami said, giving Yugi a weird look, taking a step towards the crosswalk. Yugi didn't move. _Oh, no…_

"You… didn't…?"

"No."

Yugi put his face in his hands, and he felt his heart rate shoot up. _Not now, not here…wait for a while, dammit…_

"What is it?" Yami asked, sounding a little concerned.

"Yugi?"

_Not now…_Yugi shook his head, and tried to calm his breathing again.

"Don't worry, I'm fine," he said, albeit a little too hastily. Yami frowned, and took a step towards Yugi, saying,

"You look like you're going to keel over—" Yami gasped, and froze in his tracks. His eyes widened, and he gasped again.

"Yami?"

But Yami didn't respond. He clutched at his chest, and reached out beside him for something, clutching onto the first thing it touched—which happened to be pole .

"Yami!" Yugi stated firmly, to get his attention, but Yami didn't seem to hear. He merely stared ahead, and struggled to keep standing. Yugi tried to get his arm out of Yami's grasp so he could try to support Yami, or try to help—but before he could do anything else, Yami had fallen over, gasping.

"Hey—!" Yugi protested, as he was brought to his knees by Yami's fall; he was still holding on to Yugi's arm. He cringed, as he landed on yet another bruise, and for a brief second, his side flared up in pain again and he forgot what was happening. Another chocking gasp from Yami brought him back, though, and he finally managed to yank his arm out from Yami's death grip. Yami didn't seem to notice that, either; he stared ahead, both hands clutching at his chest, gasping for air. He was turning blue.

"Yami!" Yugi said for a third time, and this time Yami looked up. His gasping stopped—he didn't look like he was breathing at all. His eyes widened even more than they were before, and they looked in danger of falling out of his head.

"GHAAAAH!" he suddenly shouted, in a strangled voice that sounded nothing like his own. At this point, Yugi was wondering why on earth no one else was around—sure, it was the weekend but this was downtown for Christ's sake! He didn't have a cellphone! The nearest phone was…he didn't know! He didn't know if he could even move—

Slowly, Yami's hand lifted off the ground. He sat back on his knees, entranced, staring ahead at the same spot he was before. Yugi watched as his arm came up and stopped at eye level, hand shaking as it directed Yugi's sight to what Yami was seeing.

Yugi didn't want to turn around. But another strangled shout from Yami's throat (more frightened this time), and Yugi consented, slowly turning on the spot, feeling a very cold, acidic sense of dread…

There, floating before Yami's outstretched arm was a translucent figure, arms and neck covered in mounds of translucent silvery jewelry, eyes large and cold, staring directly at Yami, holding him there with a gaze that crackled with anger. The cloth draped over its body suddenly billowed in an invisible wind, and it struggled to keep its stance. Yami doubled over, letting out another shout of agony—

The figure reached inside his robes, and pulled out a roll of something, which he held out to Yami. Yami, though, was on all fours at this point, gasping for air again. The wind seemed to increase in intensity, for the figure took a step back, shouting something unintelligible to Yugi in a voice loud, and commanding. The thing the figure was holding then slipped from its grasp, and fluttered into oblivion—

Yugi felt himself falling, suddenly, very far…

This was it, he was sure.

His head hit something—

He knew no more.

* * *

A/N: Fun times for our little friends, neh?

And I promise the chapters will be faster than they have been, reently…I know what I'm doing now, and I swear this cliffhanger won't be the last chapter uploaded for long. Couple weeks max, all right?

Don't kill meeeee! (hides)

And I know these were forever ago, but I'm still creating review responses for you guys. Because I didn't want to delete them, once I started…heh.

**cutehelenjames**: Thank you! Hope you liked chapter 21!

**Dragon:** heh, glad you liked Kura; I was somewhat apprehensive when I posted it if people would be like "WTF!". I'm glad he's welcomed, heh.

**Yami Yuugi:** Glad you liked the chapter!

**mechante fille: **_Another_ long review! I'm honored! And yes, Yami and Bakura do some potential there (something I didn't realize until I was reading the chapter for the last time), but I've got other plans, wahaha…and I'm glad it's realistic; it is one of my aims. Good to know that's accomplished, lol. As for spoiling…it's fun! Even though I haven't written in FOREVER, but that's okay! I have so much fun writing this fic it's kind of scary, sometimes. I'll just stop typing for a moment and clap my hands in glee at what I'm about to write, like, "yay, this part!". hehe. Summerway too much time to think about this fic…And now that school's in, it's schoolfic? What fic? …Ah, well. Glad you're enjoying this so much!

**lunasun72:** glad you liked Bakura, bizarre as he is. Hope you liked chapter 21!

**Phoenix87:** lol; ah, well, maybe I'll do some kind of offshoot sometime with just Yami and Kura. It is something to think about…and kura yelling things out to Joey at the b-ball game…hrmm, something else to think about, lol. And things will get less confusing…just after they get a little more so, hehe. Glad you're liking this fic so much!

**Anime-Blade:** lol, yes, this Kura is VERY ooc—but I'm glad you liked him. And like I told Phoenix 87: things will get less confusing, but they have to get more confusing first. Lol. Hope you liked chapter 21!

**shadows-insanity:** Glad you liked it!

**Hikari Skysong:** more human…never thought of it like that. Heh. Glad you're liking the fic, though.

**Alaqua:** ah, don't worry about it; as long as you read it, I'm happy, hehe. And that's an interesting question about Kura; I don't really know whether he's Yami or Hikari. I think I'll just say he's a combination of both; he's got qualities of both, anyway. lol.

**Counterspell:** well, like I told Alaqua; I've decide as of the five seconds ago when I was writing her review response that my version of Bakura is kind of combination of both Yami and Hikari. So in a sense, Ryou has already popped up. It'll be explained later how this Bakura's like Ryou, if that helps. Hrmm, let's see (reads review again) YAY! I rule! Cool! Learn something new every day…lol. Hope you liked chapter 21!

**Jenny C:** hehe, glad you like the responses! As long as you leave a review, I'll respond—it's my little policy I've made up for myself. Good to hear your head's better; wouldn't want to confuse the readers too much, lol!

**Ra-san:** Even though you reviewed chapter one, I'm replying to you anyway. Thank you for the compliment!

**Keeper of the Times:** Well, there you are; Yugi in full! Yay! Even though it didn't explain everything…but if I did that, that'd mean I'd have to end the story here…and that wouldn't be good. Glad you like my story, though!

**Gylzgurl:** hehe, it IS funny; only you and Kiki know what's going to go on—and what the next few stories are going to be like, too…haha. _(kisses for no apparent reason). _;-D

**DaakuKitsune:** Hrrmm, guess that means I'll have to write faster, if you're going to die on me soon! Lol. Glad you're liking it so much, though…yay! That makes me happy. And might I add that it was your review that made me realize how much I was neglecting this fanfic, with all the other stuff I've been doing recently. So in a way, you spurred me on to pick up the keyboard again and use it, lol. Thank you for that.


	22. Secrets

A/N: All right, I apologize for the cliffhanger I gave everyone. But I will make it up to you now, and explain at least some of what went on….

Chapter title: Secrets

* * *

He was floating…

But he fell.

How was that possible? That's what he was doing when he blacked out... Although Yugi had a strange, gut-level feeling that even if he were falling, there was no place to fall to.

So where was he floating?

As soon as the thought entered his mind, he stopped. Either that, or he became more aware of his surroundings, and his senses told him that he was standing upright, putting all his weight on a solid mass he could not see, looking out into a impenetrable span of blackness, and straining his ears to hear what he realized, at their ringing, was nothing.

Yet then there was another sense, another feeling that started to thread its way into his consciousness. It was nothing more than an inkling at first, a flash of thought one sees in a dream they don't remember. But as it established itself in Yugi's mind, it began to grow. Soon he was aware of it; a light something. Something totally different from that which he was surrounded by.

He realized it was a being. A being, as opposed to a thing, or an idea. Or maybe it was all three?…no…an idea wouldn't be so vivid. And a thing wouldn't know how to crawl out of the realm of darkness, and into the realm of vision; for Yugi suddenly saw a something before him, fading into view before him, looking pure white in contrast with its surroundings.

And as became more clear, Yugi recognized what it was. It stood before Yugi, staring into his mind with large, gray, translucent eyes.

The ghost.

"Hello, Yugi." it said.

Yugi looked around at the pitch blackness. He was floating through space…then he was standing. And now he was seeing a ghost…

"…am I…dead?"

"This," the ghost said, nodding to their surroundings, "is the passage between your world and mine. But it is not death."

"…so I'm _almost _dead?"

The ghost shook his head.

"You are not close to death, Yugi."

Yugi frowned in confusion.

"But _you're_ dead. Therefore I am closer to death if I am between the world you're in and the world I'm in. Ghosts are dead."

At this, the corner of the ghost's mouth twitched up in what seemed like amusement.

"How do you know that I am not living? That I am this 'ghost' you keep telling me I am?"

Yugi looked the ghost up and down.

"I can see through you. It gets really cold when you come, and I'm the only one that can see you."

"But it is like your grandfather said," the ghost replied, "everyone sees ghosts—especially in times of high stress. Like at night, in a house that is not lived in."

Yugi was silent for a moment, startled. The ghost hadn't been around to hear that…

"How did you know about that conversation?" He shot.

The ghost shrugged.

"I have ears, Yugi. I can hear."

Yugi stared incredulously at the being before him, hands folded in front of its robs, calmly standing about two yards away from Yugi. Waiting.

It disturbed Yugi.

"So…you're telling me you've been able to hear _everything_ that's been going on in my _life_?"

A nod.

"But do not take this as a bad omen," the ghost—or whatever it was—said, holding up a hand, "I do not harm."

Yugi was silent for a moment, wondering if he had heard right. Then, he let out a loud, cold laugh.

"Harm? What do you call appearing in front of Grandpa and scaring the shit out of me by freezing me half to death? What do you call whatever that was that happened just now, with Yami? He was choking! For all I know he could be dead!"

But the ghost was shaking its head.

"Yami is not dead," it stated.

"And how do _you _know?"

"Because he cannot die," the ghost replied. "Not yet."

"…_what?_ That doesn't make any sense—"

"I know it does not make sense," the ghost interrupted. "But you must believe me. I can say no more about this subject just now, but you will see. And as for the other times…the cold was not my doing. And I would have talked to you in private, had I not been hurried. Although I should have expected your reaction. I have gotten it before, in other times—"

"So it's not just me that you're visible to?"

"Right now," The ghost replied, "You are the only one that can see me. But I have been visible to others, in times before you were born. But," it said, with a wave of its hand, "that is not what I am talking about now. That which I was trying to escape from was knowing what I was doing, and was trying to keep me from seeing you. As for what happened just now, I was not trying to kill Yami." It stated. "I was trying to make him aware of my presence here. That is what the magic was for—I tried both to write it and to speak it…but I was beaten before either could work."

Yami made aware…magic…ghosts writing things…?

Yugi shook his head. This was too much.

"I don't believe you."

The ghost blinked.

"eh?"

"I said, 'I don't believe you'," Yugi repeated, enunciating his words. But the ghost was shaking its head.

"I am hearing what you said, but I do not understand it; why you do not believe me, when you are standing in between realities, talking to me?"

"Because I've heard about this kind of thing before," Yugi stated.

"…Explain, to me," the ghost prompted, "I do not understand. I am confused."

"I've seen it happen with my own eyes," Yugi stared, not sure if he wanted to voice what had been on his mind for so long. But he spoke anyway.

"It's all going to be fine at first—you're going to be my little friend inside my head that just listens to me when no one else will. Then I'm supposed to trust you and all that crap, because I've made you up in my head as the perfect companion. Am I right so far?"

The ghost merely stood, silent. After a few moments, Yugi went on.

"But then…then you're going to start telling me things. Things that you'll make me think are true, but really aren't—like how someone hates me when really they just don't notice me. Or that there's some kind of ritual that you need blood for, and I have to go find people to get it from, or some other sick thing. Either that, or you're going to take the more self-destructive approach," Yugi added, aware that his voice was starting to waver, and his voice increase in volume, "Are you going to tell me to drown myself because I'm worthless? Are you going to tell me that the world will be better off without me? When are you going to tell me that you're really a figment of my imagination, and that it was me all along? When am I going to realize that 'the voice in my head told me to do it' isn't a good explanation for the police!"

Yugi glared at him, startled by how vehement he sounded.

The ghost bowed its head, and heaved a long sigh.

"I see now," it said, in a heavy voice. "But I am not this…voice in your head. Why would I have been able to see other voices before? And why would I warn you of things, if I were here to haunt you, as this ghost would?"

Yugi was silent. He had no reply for that.

"But you do not see this, because you do not know what I am. That I am a ghost is not truth."

And, skeptical as Yugi was of this whole situation, he was curious as to how this thing—even if it was from his own mind—would explain itself.

"All right …" he said, "If that's not the truth, then what is?"

The ghost took a step forward, robes rippling with its movement through their folds. Yugi could hear the jewelry clink, and saw it shimmer in silvery wisps around the ghost's arms and neck.

"That my spirit still lives," it replied. "My life is not ending yet here, even though my body has been taken away from me. And I do not haunt in anger, as a ghost would. I wait for release into death. Just as you do. It is this that does not make me what you think I am. I know it does not make sense," the ghost added, holding up its hand as it saw Yugi's confused expression, "But in time, you will know."

"In time?" Yugi asked, feeling his anger well up again, "You haven't done enough damage already?"

At this, the ghost looked pained. It lowered its head, as it said,

"I do not mean for you to think you are losing reality. I do not mean for your grandfather to think you are doing the same."

"Then…then what _do_ you mean to do?" Yugi asked, suddenly aware that his voice was wavering again. He didn't know why… "Why are you haunting me?"

"I do not haunt," the ghost said.

"Okay, then, whatever you do!" Yugi snapped.

The ghost was silent for a moment. When it spoke again, its speech was slower, as though it were choosing its words carefully.

"I am with you, Yugi, because you are the only one who I can see, and who can see me. I can see Yami as well, but he cannot see me. He may have when I tried to reach him, but he will not recognize what I am."

"Oh, that's _really _making me believe you," Yugi said. "What kind of crap is that, 'you're the only one who can see me'? You realize that's what every person with a personality disorder thinks about their little voices? And even if they think other people can see them, it never ends up being that way?"

"If I were a 'little voice'," the ghost replied, "would you be having this conversation?"

"Maybe I would," Yugi said, shrugging. "I don't know."

"I may not seem real, yes. But to make you kill sinners…" the ghost shook is head again, "this is not why I talk to you."

"Then why?"

The ghost took a few more steps toward Yugi, stopping when he was only about three feet away.

"Because there is an evil in Yami, Yugi; this is what kept me from making Yami see me."

Yugi just looked at the ghost for a moment.

"An evil? In Yami?"

The ghost nodded.

"Yami, who is so dense that he can't figure out what's happening past the end of his nose? What does _he_ have to do with anything? Why are you trying to reach him?"

"Because Yami," the ghost replied, "has to do with everything."

Yugi paused, at the conviction in the ghost's voice. Something about the ghost's tone made it seem less what Yugi thought it was…and more of something else.

"…What do you mean?" he asked.

"What I say, Yugi. I cannot explain any more to you."

"Why not?" that 'I cannot explain' shtick was getting really annoying…

"Because if I do," the ghost said, looking directly at Yugi, "then I will not die."

The desire in the ghost's eyes was strong; suddenly Yugi saw a pain there so intense that it stunned him into whatever other sarcastic comments were floating around in his mind, half-formed. Instantly, he understood that the ghost had seen much sorrow and suffering, and that it was eating at the only part of it that it said was left; its soul.

It was torture.

…And somehow, Yugi knew for a fact that if he did create a personality from his own imagination, that he would not give it such emotions. Yugi had enough of that on his own; he wouldn't want to magnify it…

Then, as suddenly as the emotions were bared, the ghost blinked, and everything disappeared again, the ghost regaining its calm composure it had had before.

"But this is only my reason for things," it said. "Your reason, I think, is the same as Yami's reason."

Yugi frowned.

"Wait…Since when did I have a reason for helping you?"

"Since you believed that there was something in your life that you wanted to change. Something that you could become, that would ease the darkness you now live in. But," the ghost continued, waving its hand again, "this is too many words for me; I will give you one word, and you will have to believe me."

"…so what word is it?" Yugi asked, in the silence that followed.

Now, the ghost looked down at Yugi with almost a kind look—like Yugi had seen it wearing when he had seen it at school, right before he had gone into detention. Slowly, he reached out to put his hand on Yugi's shoulder, stopping only a few inches from Yugi's shirt.

"Freedom."

And before Yugi could ask the ghost to explain, it was suddenly gone. Yugi felt the ground beneath him dissolve, and he was falling as he should have been before, being sucked forwards through the darkness that had surrounded him, until—

Light.

It hurt his eyes.

Pain.

Oh, god.

Yugi inhaled sharply, causing him to start coughing so hard his whole body convulsed. He shivered in a chilly fall breeze, and rolled over onto his side on what seemed to be cold pavement. The hand that wasn't covering his mouth as he coughed reached out to feel the ground—just to make sure it was real. It seemed hard enough, and rough enough…slowly he sat up, trying to calm his throat and stomach by taking deep breaths. His eyes were watering from being exposed to so much light so quickly, and he felt the tears of irritation streaming down his face. Finally the coughing started to die down, and his eyes adjusted enough to the amount of light around them.

Yugi slowly opened his eyes, half expecting to see some other weird place of perhaps another personality that denied any connection between it and Yugi, other than just friends. But all he saw was the crosswalk he had tried to get through, before all of that had happened.

And there, next to the stop sign where he had fallen, was Yami.

Yugi's insides clenched. He didn't look very alive…

Slowly, Yugi got up from where he had fallen, and crawled over to where Yami lay facedown. He wasn't moving.

"Shit…" Yugi whispered, feeling panic start to rise in his throat. With a pale hand he reached out to Yami, hoping that he was just asleep, or unconscious, or something…

A feeble groan.

"Oh, thank god," Yugi breathed, feeling the relief flood through him. Even if it was that…evil that the ghost was talking about, or if the ghost was trying to trick him, Yugi was glad that he didn't have to try to explain to everyone why he saw Yami lying on the ground, looking as though he were strangled to death. Now, all he had to do was to get it out of Yami what he had seen without letting on that he himself knew anything about what had happened. After all, he didn't need Yami to think that he was going nuts too…even if he wasn't, it still was pretty weird. Yami probably wouldn't believe him anyway.

And so, Yugi sat back on his legs, merely watching as Yami slowly came to again, stretching out his arms in front of him, moving his head in small increments, seeming extremely disoriented and confused all the while. When he finally got his head up to where Yugi could see it, he saw that Yami's forehead had an imprint of the concrete underneath him. He was grimacing in pain—a grimace that seemed to deepen, as he lifted himself to a sitting position, his back against the pole next to the crosswalk. After a moment, he spoke.

"W…Why am I…or was I…whatever…why was I on the ground?" he asked, putting a hand to his throat as he talked. "Ow…"

"You fell over." Yugi replied, making sure that he had stripped his voice of all emotions which might give himself away. "Looks like you hit yourself pretty hard, too." He shrugged, "I guess that's why you blacked out."

Yami groaned again.

"How long was I out?"

Yugi shrugged again.

"I didn't really keep track. I just kind of…waited until you got up again."

There was a silence as Yami contemplated this. He slowly opened his eyes a little, and squinted at the spot where the ghost had appeared. And as the silence passed on, a pang of doubt went through Yugi; the ghost had said it had failed. Yami couldn't see it. He had just felt whatever it was that made him choke, and had passed out from lack of oxygen. That was it. That was all—

"How…exactly did I black out?"

"Um…" Yugi paused, trying to think of a good scenario. He decided that if he stuck with the truth enough, he could come back to it later more easily, if Yami asked about it again. It was a pain, after all, to remember complicated lies. Yugi could do it, but it wasn't fun to try and remember.

"You kind of…started yelling, and you pointed at something…and then you blacked out."

Another groan.

"Shit…" Yami said, letting his hand travel to the back of his neck. Yugi could see from where he was kneeling that the back of Yami's neck was peeling, and Yami hissed in pain when his fingers touched it. When he pulled his hand away, there was wet skin attached to Yami's fingers.

"What's that from?" Yugi asked, in spite of himself. It looked like a really bad burn to him, but he wasn't sure…

"I-It's nothing." Yami said, flicking the skin away. Yugi could see right through it, though; Yami's voice wavered with fear, and his face advertised how hard he was trying to cover it up.

Idiot…

Yami grimaced in pain, clutching his shirt at the center of his chest so tightly that his knuckles turned white.

"Shit…" he muttered.

"I don't remember you being burned before," Yugi said. Yami turned to him. "Before you blacked out, I mean."

Yami closed his eyes, and shook his head.

"Like I said, it's nothing. It was there before."

"…Ah."

There was a silence, as Yami sat there with his eyes shut, hand clenched at his chest, and Yugi kneeled a few feet away from him, wondering…

Why was it that there was no one around? Was it because of the ghost? The 'evil' that had repelled it? Because if it was the evil that had repelled it, then it must have been a pretty strong evil. It literally blew the ghost away, from what Yugi saw… and Yami…

Yami was choking. Was that part of the evil too? And this was all assuming that the ghost was telling the truth in the first place; there was still the possibility that this was all just something that Yugi's mind had conceived…but that wouldn't explain the burn on Yami's neck; Yugi knew that wasn't there before—he could read it in Yami's expression when he pulled his own skin off. He was in pain. Serious pain. He didn't look anything close to pained, when Yugi had first seen him, however long it was ago, now. He had looked awkward, but that was about it—

"Did you…feel cold, or anything?" Yami asked.

"…What do you mean?" Yugi replied.

"Before I blacked out…"

Yugi shook his head. A little too hastily, but Yami wouldn't figure it out. He was pretty dense as far as that went.

"No," he said. Yami's brow furrowed in an even deeper confusion.

"But…" he tilted his head down again to stare at the place where the ghost had appeared again. Yugi looked there too, just to see if there was anything _to_ look at. There wasn't.

"…so I just kind of…started yelling, and I pointed at something, and then I fell over?"

"um…yeah, that's pretty much it," Yugi said, still staring at the spot where the ghost had been. After a silence, he turned back to Yami.

Yami was peering at him thoughtfully.

"…What?" Yugi asked. He had never seen that look on Yami before; it was like he was latching on to something. And right now, it was a look that Yugi didn't like.

"Are you _sure _that's it?" Yami asked.

Yugi nodded.

"Then why did you freak out when you heard something when I didn't say anything?"

Yugi was silent, as he remembered the words;

"_Do not blame me for this, whatever it is ending up being."_

The ghost had apologized before the whole thing had happened. He'd forgotten about that.

"You're leaving something out, Yugi."

"I just thought I heard something, that's all," Yugi replied hastily, getting up. "I was sick earlier. I had a fever and I was hearing things, and all…" he shrugged, "I just thought I was still hearing things."

Yami slowly got up, too. Yugi waited while he did it; he didn't know why, upon reflection. Because when Yami got up, he crossed his arms, and sighed.

"So you were sick, you heard something, you saw me freak out, and you waited until I came to? Wouldn't calling someone be better? What if I died, and you didn't know it, and sat here waiting for me to wake up for hours?"

And in spite of himself, Yugi thought of what the ghost had said, about how Yami couldn't die yet, for some reason. He shrugged.

"I just…you didn't look dead. Your heart was still beating and everything, so I just kind of let you wake up on your own."

There was a tense pause, between them. Yugi sighed, and picked up the history book he had dropped. The history book that he wouldn't have if Joey hadn't given it back to him. Yugi shook his head; why was he thinking about that now?

"Anyway," he said, "I just remembered I've got…stuff to do, back at the shop. Um…" he tried to think of what else he could say, but nothing came to mind. So, he shrugged again, and said, "Yeah. I'll…see you at school."

But before he could get too far, Yami said something that made him freeze.

"You know what I saw."

"I told you—"

"You lied." Yami interrupted, "We both know you did."

Yugi didn't attempt to correct him. He just stood there, unmoving. He could hear Yami walking to him slowly, with deliberate steps. Soon, he could see Yami's figure before him.

"Look," came a slightly lowered, nervous voice, "I—I know about a few things that might explain it. I don't know how, exactly, but if you could tell me what this…thing was, then maybe I could figure it out."

Yugi looked up.

"I doubt you could," he stated. Yami's expression seemed startled for a moment, but he regained himself quickly.

"W—what?"

"What did the…the thing look like?" Yugi asked. He needed to make sure of something…

Yami frowned, obviously trying to remember.

"It was…a person, it looked like…someone in robes…but I don't know for sure. Does that sound familiar?"

Yugi was silent, for a moment. There was not much more he could lie about; Yami had seen through everything. He didn't know how he had done it, but he had—and Yugi was honestly quite startled by it; it seemed there was more to Yami than what met the eye. He had Yugi cornered, now.

But at the same time, Yami's description of the ghost gave Yugi a swoop of hope; after all, if Yami had seen the same thing…that could mean that Yugi wasn't going nuts after all. It couldn't have been a mass hallucination …could it?

The ghost may have been right about something. Even if it said that Yami couldn't see it…perhaps whatever it was trying to do had worked, for a brief second in time—just enough for Yami to get a good glimpse of it.

And, for the first time in a long while, Yugi felt considerably better.

"Yugi?"

Blinking, Yugi looked back to Yami. He was waiting for an answer. Here goes nothing…

Slowly, Yugi nodded.

"That…sounds right…"

* * *

A/N: And there you go! Cliffie solved! Now I can focus on my work again without having my mind wander to this fic for a while! I've only got about two weeks, but still. It's something. Hehe.

Enjoy your review responses, and expect some more explaining in about two weeks, at the most. That seems to be a good span of time for me to finish typing a chapter…

**DaakuKitsune**: YAY! I'm author-y! And it's preventing me from massacre by readers! AND I got a bomb shelter? I must reward this good work! (gives chocolate and graham crackers). For the marshmallows, you know. Hope they didn't burn in the wait!

**Crimson Eyed Dragon: **lol, me? Have a knack for cliffies? Gasp! Never! And what you didn't find out in this chapter will come about in due time, Dragon…in good time. I promise it'll all be explained by the last chapter of the story. Lol.

**Counterspell: **hope that de-confused you enough for the time being—I think now I'm starting to explain more than I'm going to confuse. But I don't know; so much of this story right now is impromptu, so I myself don't have much knowledge of how I'm going to reveal it all. It'll all be explained in the end, of course. But I hope you liked what I DID end up explaining in this chapter…

**Anime-Blade:** Did this de-confused you a bit? If not…erm…I'll try to de-confuse more next chappie, but I can't make that many promises…stay tuned, though! I'll explain it eventually! lol.

**Hikari Skysong:** Well, I can safely say that from here on out, things are going to be leaning towards getting explained, instead of getting more complicated. Hope you liked this chapter, and that it wasn't as confusing as the last one!

**Anora:** How's this for clearing up? I know I didn't explain everything, but I hope it did make the confusion less…

**mechante fille:** Aww, I miss you too! But college is making me so busy, I only have time to comment on things. I wish I could come to the chats, but something pops up EVERY TUESDAY—it's amazing. But I think over thanksgiving or something I'll be able to come on and catch up on things. Lol, I like your word for my chapter; mind-bendy. It makes me laugh. I'm sorry about your Uncle, though. Hope things go as well as they can for him. And the update is a lot sooner than it was before, so that makes me happy, too. Hope you liked the chapter, and that it was less confusing than the last one!

**rogueandkurt**: lol, yes I AM back! WAHAHA!….(ahem) anyway, I'm glad you like my writing style! That makes me happy—and it makes me want to write more! Hehe. And I like how you described the chapter as intriguing, instead of confusing. You're the only person to do so, but that just makes it an original statement. Hope you keep enjoying the story!

**Blue September:** Yay, I'm glad you're excited by my little addition at the end, there. To be truthful, that was a last-minute thing. I went through with it here, but it definitely made it easier for me to get out what I wanted to in this chapter. And yes, Yugi finally said what was on his mind; a big step for him. It's good to know he got a couple cheers when he did it, too. Hope you liked this chapter!

**Phoenix87:** lol, don't worry; the 'ah I get it' part, as you put it, will be coming soon. Hope this chapter cleared up some things for you. And Yugi did kind of open up to Yami…sort of…lol. Guess we'll see if he does any more later. Like I admitted to someone else, even I don't quite know what's coming next—one of those joys of writing, hehe….

**Skittles the Sugar Fairy:** Glad you like the fic so much! And I hope the chapter wasn't as Yargh-ish as the last one was…but as it's your word, you can decide that for yourself. Hope you liked it!

**Shell:** Aww, I'm glad you like my story so much! And it is kind of sad, how Grandpa thinks Yugi is going nuts, but it'll all turn out in the end; I've already given away that this story will have a happy ending, as I don't want anyone to suffer too much—the I'D get sad! Lol. Hope you liked the chapter!

**Shigatsu87:** aww…bad place to catch up on what's been going on, I know. Hope this chapter cleared up some things for you, and that it wasn't too long of a wait. And as for the apparition having something to do with it…I think I can safely say (without giving too much away) that he has a BIG part in it…what part that is I'll let everyone know in time. Hope you liked the chapter!


	23. Hesitance

A/N: FINALLY! I'm so sick of looking at this chapter! I've been trying to work on it for so long…UGH.

So now, maybe I can clear up what the hell I sent Yugi and Yami through, recently…I think in this chapter things will start to make sense—as reluctant as the both of them are to reveal anything…

Let us see what happens, shall we?

Chapter title: Hesitance

* * *

He groaned. Something was whispered above him…he thought he recognized the voice…but before he could think too much about it, he was slapped back to reality by a sickening wave of pain and nausea. He had to keep from retching, as he had enough sense to think of the fact that he might barf all over himself, if he gave in to the feeling.

He didn't know where he was. He couldn't remember.

All he knew was that he felt like he'd been dragged off the back of a truck for miles. His head was spinning, his mouth felt like it was full of sand, and one side of his face felt colder than the other.

Fuck…

He'd had a seizure.

The hands of fear and panic clamped down on his brain.

He finally went over the edge. His body was giving him one last view of the world before he kicked it.

Oh, god.

What about his family? What about—

Wait…he couldn't. Not now. He was too young.

As his mind settled on this thought, it started to reach further into itself, trying to find an explanation. Flashes of memory flew by in his mind's eye, and he grabbed onto what he could, trying to make sense of it all.

He remembered a crosswalk. And Yugi. A Cold wind. Pain. Lungs crushing. Something tugging him, wanting him to get out of the way. Falling. Dying. No air. White robes. Stranger. Surprised look. Darkness.

Yami opened his eyes.

And as he blinked through the light of the thin fall sun, he realized that the half of his face that was cold was smashed against the pavement. The crosswalk was ahead of him. The one that he and Yugi had never gotten to crossing.

Speaking of which…where was he? Unless Yugi ran away, he should be on Yami's other side…

ooh, okay, not a good idea.

Yami stopped lifting his head, keeping his mouth shut and closing his eyes again. His head was spinning, now…and pain started to finger its way up Yami's neck and all over his skull.

God, he felt like shit…

Still, he didn't let himself put his head down again (much as he longed to). He wanted to find out what the hell happened, and he wanted to find out _now._ So, after what seemed like an eternity, he had lifted his head up enough to see what was on his other side, on the rest of the sidewalk.

There was Yugi, sitting completely still. Watching.

If Yami could have rolled his eyes without losing his last meal, he would have. Figured. Yami freaks out and has some kind of fit, and all Yugi does is stare.

But what _had _he seen, exactly? Had Yami gotten hit by a car? He felt like it…more like run over, really…but he didn't remember a car anywhere. Maybe it hit him before he noticed? Yami frowned, a little. He wasn't _that _dense, even if he did remember only snippets of things that were hazy and ambiguous—like a dream slowly slipping away.

With much effort, Yami pushed himself up, clenching his jaw as his whole body flared up in aching pain, every time he moved a muscle. He didn't stop, though. He figured that he'd better get to a position where he could at least hurl somewhere other than down his front. Maybe in the gutter, or something…

Yami forced himself off the ground and into a sitting position, leaning against the stop sign's pole as slowly as he could manage without falling over. After all, he just wanted to _barf_ in the gutter. He didn't want to be _in _the gutter. There was a difference.

When he had settled, Yami let his head roll over to where Yugi was still sitting. Silent.

It seemed rather odd, to Yami. Was he so shocked by Yami's state that he wasn't saying anything? Or did he just not care?

Whatever it was, the silence unnerved Yami. But he knew that the only way it was going to stop is if Yami himself said something. See how Yugi handled someone _talking _to him, of all things…

"W…Why am I…" Yami started, but stopped after only four words; his throat felt completely raw. His hand flew up to his neck, and he continued, "or was I…whatever…why was I on the ground?"

He swallowed, to try to get rid of the cracked feeling all the way down his throat. All it did was make everything hurt more.

"Ow…"

"You fell over," he heard Yugi say. Yami noticed that his voice sounded a bit strange.

Ahead of him was a stretch of sidewalk Yami recognized, for some reason…he had seen someone there, he was sure…

"Looks like you hit yourself pretty hard, too. I guess that's why you blacked out."

So he had blacked out. Yami groaned. Lovely.

"How long was I out?" Yami croaked.

"I really didn't keep track," Yami heard Yugi saying, "I just kind of…waited until you go up again."

Yami took a moment to think about that.

So he had just…fallen on the ground? He didn't remember a reason to…Then again, he didn't remember much at all…except for feelings…

Yami stared hard at the sidewalk in front of him, trying to remember why exactly that stretch of sidewalk rung a bell…suddenly, in a flash of white robes came to mind, billowing around a figure in a gale. An expression…someone had been surprised to see him.

Who?

Yami shook his head.

This wasn't making sense. At all.

"How…_exactly _did I black out?" He asked.

Yugi paused for a moment.

"Um…You kind of…started yelling, and you pointed at something…and then you blacked out."

Come to think of it, Yami did remember yelling…but he didn't realize it had been _him_…Yami groaned. _That's _why his throat felt so shitty.

"Shit…" Yami croaked again, letting his head fall back onto the stop sign's pole. He closed his eyes, trying to piece it all together. His head hurt from thinking about it, but this was just too weird to cast aside until he got better.

So Yugi had seen him yell, then black out. And Yami had seen…Well, he hadn't really seen anything. He'd felt things more than he saw them.

He'd felt… like he was slowly being crushed to death. Something had been tugging at him. It had been pulling at him so strongly that Yami was sure he was going to snap. His very bones had felt like they were going to crack, the strain was so much…but at the same time, he'd felt like he was being crushed into a small space, too narrow for him to ever fit into alive. Before he had apparently blacked out, he remembered feeling like his lungs were no longer functioning. And then…darkness. Yami remembered his last thought being death.

He thought he had died. Apparently he didn't, but he remembered being so sure…

Yami gave his head a shake. It scared him, thinking about that now that he was breathing again…

Suddenly, the back of his neck flared up in pain.

He didn't even notice that his hand had traveled to the back of his neck, out of nervousness. Not that it was surprising. The part that was odd, thought was the fact that he now feeling wetness underneath his fingers.

What on earth—?

It felt like something was stuck to the back of his neck, and the glue hadn't finished drying yet…He pulled his hand out from under his shirt, and felt whatever it was come with it. Holding it by a couple fingers, Yami brought it around to where he could see it…

He frowned at the object, trying to discern what it was. It was limp, yet crinkly in some spots. For some reason, it almost looked like burnt skin, to Yami—

Yami's eyes snapped open from their tired, half-closed state.

Burnt skin.

From the back of his neck.

Right where the chain of his necklace was…

Oh, god.

"What's that from?" someone asked. Yami started: he had forgotten Yugi was there, for a moment. His voice sounded distant.

"I—it's nothing," Yami spat out hastily, not even paying attention to how he said it. His mind was numb and racing, as he tried to comprehend… pulling…crushing…right at his chest.

His chest. That's where the pendant was.

Oh, god.

The Demon!

Yami clutched at his chest, where he felt the pyramid under his long-sleeved t-shirt. Panic tore at his insides, and his heart started beating painfully in his chest.

"Shit…" he hissed, his mind racing frantically.

What had he _done_? It wasn't like he'd been trying to take it off again…he hadn't done that in years! It had been forever since he had tried anything like that…

Although he hadn't been all that enthusiastic about passing it on…and after the fight with Dad a while ago…

Then, a horrible thought clenched Yami's insides, making his breathing more sporadic than it was before. He could hear it. Yet he didn't feel like he could do anything about it; all his energy was focused on one thought, and one thought alone:

What if it—the necklace—thought Yami didn't want to deal with what he would have to do, eventually?

Hell, it didn't think. It knew.

It _knew_ Yami didn't want to pass it on. Much as he hated to admit it to himself, there was no fooling anyone now.

He just didn't want to.

And the Demon knew.

"I don't remember you being burned before."

Yami blinked, and looked to Yugi. What the hell was he talking about…?

"Before you blacked out, I mean."

Yami closed his eyes, shaking his head. There was no way Yugi was going to find out about this…he had let too much slip already—to Anzu, and to Bakura…too much…he knew…the demon _knew_!

"Like I said, it's nothing," Yami said. "It was there before." He prayed that Yugi wouldn't ask anything more…of _all_ the times…this was bad. Oh, god, this was really bad….

"…ah." Yugi said.

Yami tried to calm himself down before he really _did_ have a seizure. He had already freaked Yugi out enough with all the yelling and falling and whatever else he had done…he needed to get a grip on himself. He couldn't panic. Not now, not when he was still around someone that didn't know. He could do that later. He could panic when he got home.

And, as hard as it was, Yami forced himself to take a deep breath, and hold it for a moment. Letting it out, Yami gathered what few thoughts he had running rampant in his head at the moment, and tried to focus on what exactly had happened. He needed to know everything that Yugi saw, because right now, he needed to explain his actions. Cover his tracks as best he could. All Yugi was getting was some bullshit that explained what he had seen. Nothing more.

_Okay,_ Yami thought, taking another deep breath, shoving his panicked thoughts forceably to a corner of his mind, and focusing his energy on the problem. _Start from the beginning. _

They had met. They were about to cross. Then the wind.

"Did you…feel cold, or anything?"

Yami looked to Yugi, and found Yugi's expression to be as strange as his voice.

"…What do you mean?"

"Before I blacked out…" Yami explained.

Yugi shook his head quickly.

"No."

Yami frowned slightly, thinking it odd that Yugi would ever remind him of a wet dog drying off. Yet he did now.

"But…" Yami said aloud, looking away. Yugi was acting too suspicious to just have seen Yami yell for a bit, then black out. Or maybe he wasn't. There was only one way to find out.

Yami went through it all again, this time out loud.

"…so I just kind of…started yelling, and I pointed at something, and then I fell over?"

"Um…" Yugi said, in that same strange voice, "Yeah, that's pretty much it."

Yami looked at Yugi's expression carefully, watching as he spoke. He had a feeling that something wasn't right…

Then, as though a switch had been flipped, Yami saw it. He recognized the badly hidden nervousness, the fidgetiness that Yami had never seen in Yugi before, the way his eyes never met Yami's.

There was lie written all over that face. Yami could smell it from where he sat, even in his chaotic state. He had no idea _how _he knew. He just…did.

Yami had the fleeting thought that he had finally figured out what his mother did to him all the time.

"What?" Yugi asked. He'd noticed Yami watching him. He looked guilty, too. Yami stared at him for a moment, trying to think of that discrepancy that he knew was hiding somewhere, in this story of Yugi's…where was the lie the weakest? Where could Yugi least explain himself—

Suddenly, Yami remembered something else that had happened, just before he had felt the cold wind.

"Then why did you freak out when you heard something when I didn't say anything?"

Yugi was silent.

Hah.

Inwardly, Yami gave himself a cheer.

"You're leaving something out, Yugi." Yami stated.

Quick, hasty excuses proceeded to fall from Yugi's mouth.

"I just thought I heard something, that's all." He got up from where he had been sitting on the ground as he spoke. "I was sick earlier. I had a fever and I was hearing things, and all…" a shrug—to make it all seem casual. "I just thought I was still hearing things."

Yami mirrored Yugi in getting up, not wanting him to flee quite yet. Ignoring the throbbing his head was giving him, Yami iterated the lie back to Yugi.  
"So you were sick, you heard something, you saw me freak out, and you waited until I came to? Wouldn't calling someone be better? What if I had died and you didn't know it, and sat here waiting for me to wake up for hours?"

Now that he voiced it, it seemed even more suspicious.

Yugi was really trying now. Yami could see it in the way he was becoming more unlike himself every minute. He looked uncharacteristically uneasy.

"I just…you didn't look dead. Your heart was still beating and everything, so I just kind of let you wake up on your own."

Yami paused, in reply.

He didn't even know what to say to that. How lame did Yugi think he was, trying to feed him shit like that? And Yami would have thought he was _good _at lying…why was he faltering so much, when he could keep himself so well hidden so much of the time?

"Anyway," Yugi continued, "I just remembered I've got…stuff to do, back at the shop. Um…Yeah. I'll…see you at school."

Yami watched as he struggled to leave, picking up his history book as he talked. Yami was sure he wasn't _this_ bad at lying. Something must have shaken him. Something that Yugi had never seen or experienced before in his life…

Something impossible.

"You know what I saw." Yami stated. And, judging by the way Yugi froze in his tracks, Yami's prediction was right. Yugi had seen, Yami could safely assume, pretty much everything.

Not that this made him feel any better….on the contrary, Yami felt as though he had just gotten impaled through his stomach.

Meanwhile, Yugi was trying to defend himself again.

"I told you—"

"You lied," Yami cut Yugi off, not wanting to hear any more babble. He didn't think he could patiently listen to it—again. "We both know you did."

Again, Yugi was silent. He was completely still for a long moment.

Yami walked over to him, wondering just how he was going to explain this. As it was, Yugi had seen way too much. As much as Yami didn't like it, he figured he'd have to tell Yugi some things he really didn't plan on. Like the necklace.

So, swallowing the lump of fear that was growing in his throat, and battling the panic that so badly wanted to take control to the back of his mind, Yami offered something he wasn't planning on.

"Look," he said, in a lowered voice, "I—I know about a few things that might explain it. I don't know how, exactly, but if you could tell me what this…thing was, then maybe I could figure it out."

Yami would have specified, but he didn't know how Yugi had seen what had gone on. Or what he had remembered. Yami figured he would get Yugi to tell him his perspective, and he'd work from there.

"I doubt you could," Yugi stated.

Yami blinked, startled. _He_ was the one with the curse! How did Yugi even think—

hold on.

Yugi didn't know about the curse. So maybe to him, it all seemed like a delusion in _his _mind….

"W—what?" Yami asked, keeping the element of surprise up. Playing dumb. He was good at that…and he had the feeling that that's what Yugi thought of him as—the clueless, blundering idiot. Why else would Yugi have lied to him like that?

"What did the…the thing look like?" Yugi asked.

So he was playing that game too. He was trying to get information without revealing anything. But Yami knew that wasn't going to get anywhere, if they both did it. Better take a chance.

Yami frowned, trying to recall what it had looked like, exactly.

"It was…a person," he said, "it looked like…someone in robe…but I don't know for sure. Does that sound familiar?"

For a while, Yami didn't get an answer. Yugi simply stared down at the ground between them, silent.

"Yugi?" Yami prompted. Then, with a great effort, Yugi said,

"That…sounds right…"

Yami sighed, and looked to the stretch of concrete where he had fallen on. This was going to be hard.

Really hard.

"Was it wearing a white robe?" Yami asked.

Again, Yugi nodded.

"And he had a lot of jewelry on."

Yami nodded with him. He didn't remember jewelry, but he'd take Yugi's word for it. Yami was fishing for another question to ask, when his thoughts cut off by Yugi saying,

"Let's get to the library."

Yami blinked. What did that have to do with anything?

As if on cue, a woman walked by, eyeing Yami carefully. Behind him, a car zoomed by. The world came alive around them again, where it had been desolate before. Whether it was through a lack of focus, or if it had to do with something involving the curse, Yami didn't know. But he did agree that someone could hear them, out here.

Yami nodded.

"Let's go."

The silence between them, as they crossed the street and walked up the steps, was somehow less strained than Yami remembered feeling it at school, the past few times they had talked.

When they got in, Yugi suddenly veered off to the side, walking with purpose. Yami followed. Yugi probably knew the place better than he did. He never did end up at the library, most of the time. But it wasn't for a lack of interest in reading—it was just that usually, he was doing other things.

Like pulling burnt pieces of skin off the back of his neck…

Yami shook his head again, forcing his mind to focus on rational thoughts.

"Hey."

Yami blinked; Yugi wasn't in front of him anymore. Instead, there was a shelf of law books. Turning, Yami saw that they were in a secluded cove of bookshelves, the very air around them thick with age and stagnancy.

Next to him, there was a small table, with three chairs. Yugi was already sitting at one of them, staring across the narrow space at whatever titles were on the shelf. His expression was completely unreadable.

Yami sat down in the chair nearest to him.

Nothing was said for a long while. Personally, Yami could understand why; what they had just been confronted with would shock anyone into silence.

If indeed that was what was keeping Yugi silent. Yami could only guess.

"What do you know?"

Yami turned to Yugi.

"…I can't say, exactly." Yami replied, shrugging. "I just…know some things that might explain why some guy in a robe suddenly popped out of nowhere."

Yugi's expression leered toward the skeptical.

"So tell me what they are."

…Ah. Yugi was trying to make him talk first.

"…What about you?" Yami asked. "You didn't want to tell me anything about the person in the first place."

Yugi looked away, at that.

"It's a ghost, Yami. Not a person."

Yami's eyes narrowed. Wait…

"How do you know it's a ghost?"

Yugi was still staring at the spot he had averted his eyes to.

"I just know, all right?"

"Just like I 'just know' about things that might help solve this."

Yugi looked back to Yami, who was eyeing him for any more signs of deceit, as they were so easily seen, now. Yugi blinked, observing Yami himself from behind that blank mask, again.

"Well…that means we both know things that the other one wants to."

Yami nodded.

"So," Yugi continued, in the same tone, "…one of us has to start."

A very immature part of Yami's mind wanted him to shout 'not it!', but he stopped himself. This was serious. Especially when Yami was trying to convince Yugi that he was worthy of knowing Yugi's side of the story.

"Well…" Yami said, "let's just…start with what happened. Then we can go from there."

Yugi shrugged, unconvincingly apathetic, eyes fixed again on the bookshelves to the left of Yami.

"Okay…" Yami said, after a silence: obviously, Yugi wasn't going to start talking anytime soon... "Let's start with the wind."

Yugi looked to him; he seemed somewhat confused.

"I didn't feel a wind," he said.

"…Oh.." Yami replied. Then, he shook his head; it wasn't that important that Yugi did or didn't know that bit. "Well, I did. And then after that…you thought I said something. What did you hear?"

Another silence. Yami was just about to get Yugi's attention, when Yugi looked down at the table, took a breath, and said,

"I heard him saying…'forgive me, whatever this is ending up being'. His English was…really bad."

Yami frowned.

"Who said that?"

"The ghost," Yugi replied, in a monotone.

"…the ghost that I saw?" Yami asked.

Yugi nodded slightly. He seemed stunned.

Yami thought for a moment on this. Why would a ghost in a robe affect his necklace? Why was this ghost there in the first place? Where did it come from? Better yet—

"How did you know it was a ghost?" Yami asked aloud. Again.

He didn't get a response at all. After sitting through three minutes of uncomfortable silence, Yami tried to bring Yugi out of his thoughts.

"Yugi?" he asked, leaning over to his left to look Yugi in the eye. Yugi blinked, and looked down at the table again. Yami would have asked if Yugi had heard him, but it was pointless; Yami knew he had. Yugi was just avoiding it.

"I just know." Yugi said, his voice barely audible.

"_How_ do you know?" Yami pressed.

"How do you know about things that might explain it?" Yugi shot back.

"I grew up with them!" Yami snapped. Then he kicked himself, mentally, and put a hand over his eyes. That was too far. He _really_ shouldn't have said that…but considering how pointless this whole conversation was, it wasn't a wonder he was getting frustrated.

"Look," he said, in a library voice again, "There's just some…knowledge that's been kept in my family for a while, and there's some… stories that might explain this."

"I doubt it."

Yami took his hand down and peered at Yugi.

"What do you mean?"

Again, it took Yugi a while to answer. But when he did, it only confused Yami even more.

"I've…I've seen it before…that's how I know it's a ghost. Well—it tells me that it's not, but I don't know what else to call it."

Yami was frowning deeply, and Yugi's words. Maybe he was right. Maybe it wasn't the necklace at all.

But…Yami's neck was in pain, right now. The necklace had burned him severely, when he was…whatever he had been doing. This had something to do with the curse. But what?

Yami shook his head. He needed to find out more about this…ghost that wasn't a ghost before he got into _that_ whole line of thought.

"So this…ghost thing has talked to you before? And it's told you about itself?"

A slight nod from Yugi.

"It's mentioned you."

Yami blinked, at that; it was completely unexpected.

"What…did it say…?"

Yugi sighed.

"It was trying…to contact you, when…you were choking. I don't know why, but it said…it said that you had to do with a lot of things. He sees you, but you can't see him."

"..except I did," Yami added distantly.

"He didn't expect that." Yugi said. "He thought he'd be driven away."

"I only saw him for a moment," Yami said, staring past the bookshelves into his memory, "He was being pulled back…."

"blown back," Yugi said.

Yami blinked.

"Blown back?"

Yugi nodded.

"Something was blowing him back."

Yami frowned, at that. Surely it wasn't Yami himself blowing him back…something else must have been near Yami…

Yami closed his eyes. He had an idea of what it might, be, but if he thought about that right now, he was sure he'd lose it. He'd say something he didn't really need to.

"So…" Yami said, shaking his head, "he's appeared to you before?"

Yugi nodded.

"When did it start?"

Yugi thought for a moment.

"This semester." He finally said. Yami nodded. So this was a recent going on—

Suddenly, Yugi stood up, picking up his things.

"I've got to go," he said hurriedly.

"What?" Yami asked, startled by the sudden decision. "What about—"

"Whatever," Yugi said. Yami frowned.

"What do you mean, 'whatever'? don't you want to know what this is?"

"Yes, but I'm not going to waste any more time on it right now." Yugi got up and tried to leave the area, but Yami grabbed his arm. Yugi outright glared at him.

"Listen," Yami said, giving Yugi his own glare, "This isn't something you can run away from."

"What do you know?" Yugi shot back, making sure to whisper. Somehow, the statement sounded more severe when it was hissed.

"I know a lot more than you think I do, for one," Yami said. Yugi shook his head.

"Yeah, right."

Yami paused, scrutinizing Yugi again. Yami knew that Yugi drew into himself. But it was only now when he realized that there was something more in it than an inability to talk; there was a distance between Yugi and the rest of the world. He could see it in the abrupt way Yugi was yanking on his arm, trying to leave.

Yami had gone too far, and Yugi had decided to cut him off before he got any further.

"Stop staring at me!"

Yami let go of Yugi's arm. Yugi stood where he was, glaring daggers, defensive.

"You wouldn't even understand!" he said, suddenly. "I don't understand half of it myself! And I actually think!"

Yami's eyes narrowed.

"So you think I'm some shallow flake?"

"I'm just telling you what you are!"

Yami stood up, looking down at Yugi.

"Look," He snapped, still whispering, "Just because I act clueless doesn't mean I don't know anything! You don't think I know how that feels? I know damn well what it's like to be completely alone, with no way out! It's hell! You're not the only one in the world that's been depressed before, all right? So just—don't even talk, if that's the only shit that's going to come out of your mouth!"

"So now I'm full of shit?"

"You're—"

But Yugi was already walking away.

Yami closed his eyes, and felt the acid mass of panic start to eat away at his stomach again, undaunted by Yami's efforts to keep it hidden.

* * *

A/N: Hrmm. Not quite what I expected. But I'm moving on anyway. Hopefully something came out of that, even though I'm kind of re-hashing what went on at the crosswalk. But _some_ information was exchanged, yes?

Eh, well. I'll let you guys decide if it's an okay chapter. Heh.

On a side note, something has happened that has made me very happy; I have attained the goal of having exactly 10 reviews per chapter, on average.

ISN'T THAT AWESOME?

Hee! It makes me happy.

(12/9/05 edit)

I know, the review responses were here yesterday, but I have been informed that Reveiew responses are no longer allowed on this site. And even if they aren't (as I have not checked the rules) I'm still taking the precaution, as I don't want my one story that I've worked so hard on to get deleted.

Look on my bio page for more information about where to find the responses. I still do them…just not on this website.

Anyway, on another side note; I changed the summary of the story. I thought the other one sounded crappy, so that's why it's different. Tell me what you think of it—if you care, that is.


	24. Fears

A/N: Well, this took a little longer than expected; I had to do a little guerrilla writing here, since my regular computer's at my dorm, and I'm here at home for break. But between three different computers and that wonderful thing called e-mail attachments, I have managed to get this finished. Yay!

I apologize profusely for the weird formatting that some of you had to read through last chapter; I was having problems uploading, and I was having to get it onto from notepad, instead of word, like I normally do. But everything's back to normal, more or less, and the chapters look regular again. So, let us cheer for that.

And now, let us continue our story—with something a little more varied than the last three chapters have been (for which I also apologize, if that seemed a bit dull to anyone. Heh.)

Chapter title: Fears

* * *

Yami really didn't pay attention to his surroundings, as his body led him home. He let his consciousness drown in the thoughts he had hidden from himself since the accident—although wild panic would be a more accurate way to describe what he found pouring from the depths of his mind. The only thought that he had right now was that the demon knew.

But that alone was enough. Once he left the library and was on the way home, he felt his breathing leave all regularity, and his chest clench in fear. He held his necklace, trying to ignore the pain that was searing around his neck. He saw the concrete in front of him through a haze, could sense the concerned stares of passersby pressing on him, as though through a pane of glass—useless, but ever there. He felt pressure on his lungs, air leaving him, anger that wasn't his own coursing through him, his own blood boiling in his veins—

Yami blinked.

He was at his own front door, trying to get it open. He yanked on the handle again.

It opened.

_Wow,_ Yami thought. _That's a first._

As softly as he could, Yami walked in. For now, all he felt like doing was hiding in his room until he had calmed down a little. Or when his stomach wasn't churning as much. Whichever came first.

The only problem was getting up the stairs. He was so _exhausted_. He'd only walked from the library, though…it wasn't _that_ far away…

Yami shook his head, and started dragging himself up the stairs. He just needed to rest for a little. No reason thinking about why he was tired; that part was easy—

"Yami?"

Yami paused. Mom. Turning, he saw her looking up at him from the front hall. She seemed concerned.

"Are you all right?"

Yami didn't know if he should try and evade the truth, or if he should tell his parents what he'd just been through. And while he was pondering the dilemma, he made Mom even more worried by staring blankly at her, completely still.

"Do you feel all right?" she asked, after a moment. Yami shook his head. There was no way he could fake that one.

"Do you feel sick?"

A slow nod. Yes, he did feel sick, come to think of it. Sick with stress…

Chasing the thought from his mind, Yami decided to cut things off before they got too detailed—he _really_ needed to sit down…

"I'm going to go to sleep," he croaked out. By how Mom's eyes widened, Yami guessed he sounded as bad as his throat felt.

"Yami, what happened to your _voice_?"

_Because I was yelling at the top of my lungs while sitting on a sidewalk getting my neck burned to a crisp,_ Yami thought.

But instead of saying all that, he simply shrugged.

"Started going downhill during the day," he said.

Mom didn't buy that; Yami didn't even have to be looking at her to tell that one.

"You sounded perfectly fine when you left this house to go work on your World History Project. And it hasn't even been that long," she said, looking at her watch, "I wasn't expecting you for at least another half hour. Did you guys get _anything_ done?"

Yami was silent. Quite honestly, he didn't know why he had settled on hiding what had happened; after all, this was something that his parents ought to know. If Yami hadn't been born into this family, he wouldn't have gotten attacked like he did in the first place.

Still…he didn't think he could tell them right now; his head was swimming in it, and his body was still in shock. It didn't really matter that his neck was hurting like hell. He simply didn't have the energy to piece it all together in something that wasn't understandable to anyone else besides him.

"Did you get into another fight, Yami?" Mom needled.

"I just feel really sick," he insisted.

"Yami's home already?" Dad asked, coming out of the kitchen. He glanced up at Yami as he made his way to the living room—then did a double take.

"What happened to _you_?"

"He says he's feeling sick," Mom said. Yami nodded in agreement.

"He _looks_ sick," Dad replied. Yami nodded again.

"Sleep," Yami croaked, pointing up the stairs, "Me go."

But at that, Dad's eyes only narrowed in suspicion.

"Hold on a minute," Dad said, as Yami turned to continue his climb.

"Why are you holding your shirt like that, Yami?"

Yami looked down at himself. Sure enough, he was clutching the front of his shirt so tightly that his knuckles were white. Huh. Had he ever stopped doing that since the incident? He couldn't remember.

"Um…." Yami said, staring at his hand. What was he supposed to say to that?

"You look like you're about ready to fall over," Dad stated, walking closer, "Are you sure you can get up the rest of those stairs?"

"I walked all the way home," Yami stated blankly.

"From where?" Dad asked.

"From the library."

"And you're not feeling faint?"

Yami didn't answer that. He didn't move at all, as Dad walked up the few stairs Yami had climbed, and put his arm around Yami's shoulders.

"Agh!" Yami gasped, and he made a motion to shy away from Dad's touch. But he ended up losing his balance instead, and if it hadn't been for Dad grabbing his arm, Yami would have fallen to the bottom of the stair.

"Oh, my god," Yami heard Mom gasp. "Yami? What—"

"I know what happened," Dad interrupted, his tone sharp as he helped Yami back up. "Come on, Yami, we're going to the living room."

"I just need sleep—" Yami protested, leaning away from Dad. But he stopped, when his neck flared up in pain again.

"Laura, get an ice pack and wrap it in a towel."

Yami heard Mom's footsteps hurrying into the kitchen, and the freezer open. Ice pack…? Crap…he didn't know it was that bad…Well, he could figure, but he knew how to fix this—

"Is it the necklace?" Mom asked, as Dad guided Yami to the couch facing the empty fireplace.

Yami nodded, as Dad guided him to the couch in front of the fireplace, in the living room.

"That's why I'm back early—"

"Don't lean back on the couch," Dad interjected. Yami leaned forwards again. Then, he straightened, and started to take off his shirt.

"Good," Dad said, helping Yami get his hands out of the long sleeves.

"I know what to do," Yami stated. Then, he grit his teeth; it hurt to lift his arms—a _lot._

"I've had this thing for—"

"Yes, seven years," Dad finished absently, "Hold that there."

Yami held the ice pack where Dad had placed it. Suddenly, there was a glass of water in his face.

"Huh?" He asked, voicing his confusion. That wasn't part of what usually happened when he got burned…

"Take a sip," Dad instructed. Yami did so. He watched, then, as the glass was set on the coffee table in front of the couch. It spilled a little over the sides, as it was set there abruptly.

"Amir, that looks really bad," Mom said in a quiet voice. "We need to take him in."

"How would we explain this to the doctor?"

The water spread over the coffee table's glass surface.

"Amir, he looks like he's about to pass out!"

Yami watched a couple of water droplets migrate down the outside of the glass.

"Look, he just needs water and some bandages," Dad said.

"Yami ever looked that pale? He's not supposed to be that pale!" Mom asked, her voice starting to rise.

"It's not worth the risk!" Dad countered. "If they try to take that necklace off, no excuse will be able to cover it up! And we all know what happens if too many people outside the family know about it!"

Yami moved the ice pack over a little; his collarbone was starting to get cold.

"All he needs is to keep that ice pack on him, and to be careful while it heals. It'll scar, but if he just keeps drinking and doesn't get infected, he'll be fine. You know what this is like."

"But it's never been this bad before…" Mom protested. Dad ran a hand through his hair.

"I know," he said, in a quiet voice.

In the heavy silence that followed, Yami took another sip of water. He could take a hint.

"Besides, he's still conscious. He made it home, and he's been responding to us. It's not life-threatening if we don't get him to a doctor."

Yami let out a dark laugh.

"That doesn't really matter, does it?"

"Yami…"

Yami just shrugged.

"s'true," he said, looking to Dad, "Who knows? Maybe that's why I can still talk."

There was a dead silence, after that.

Yami took another sip of water.

"Well," Dad finally said, pushing the clutter on the coffee table aside, and sitting in front of Yami, "Since you can talk, you can also tell us what happened."

Slowly, Yami nodded. He could do that…the trouble was, he really didn't want to. Sure, he was still coherent—but that didn't mean he had the energy to think about what had happened anymore.

"…Did someone try to touch it?" Dad offered.

Slowly, Yami shook his head.

"Did you try to take it off?"  
Yami blinked slowly, and looked to Dad.

"I haven't done that since I was thirteen." He croaked.

"Drink," Dad replied, nodding to the glass. Yami complied.

"…Did you try to threaten it?"

Yami didn't answer. He didn't really know. He _could _have…not wanting to pass it on—did that qualify? It wasn't direct, but it could still be considered so…

"You _need _to tell me what happened, Yami," Dad pressed. "Was it something you even did?"

…How was he supposed to say this? He had a feeling he could have made Mom and Dad understand, if they had been there right when it happened, but now…he was completely devoid of all mental capacity to verbalize much of anything.

Still, he'd have to try. If he didn't get it out right, they would understand.

Yami took a breath, focusing on a nondescript corner of the coffee table Dad was sitting on. Just start talking.

"I…fell, and…saw someone…I—I thought—"

He was so out of it that it was a challenge making a full sentence. The words got stuck in his throat.

"Thought what, Yami?" Dad pressed.

"…I couldn't breathe," Yami blurted out the first thing that came to mind. "…the demon—"

"_Demon_?" Dad interjected. Yami nodded. Dad to see him ran his hand through his hair again.

"Do you remember what might have brought it on? What did the Demon do, exactly? Do you know, Yami? Do you remember?"

Yami could hear the urgency leaking into Dad's voice, and how he was trying (without success) to cover it up.

And at the signs of Dad panicking, Yami felt his own emotions double. It was as though he were feeling all over again for the first time the magnitude of what had happened, and just how grave and serious the whole situation was.

"Shit…" He closed his eyes, and put his face in his hands. He felt everything he had been holding together, mentally, come undone, and the expectant silence around him darken, thick with apprehension and fear. Finally, Dad spoke.

"What did the Demon do, Yami?"

Yami took a breath, and let his hands fall back into his lap. Without really thinking about it, he felt his right hand go back to clutching the necklace tightly.

"It…was angry…it was trying to get rid of him…"

"Who was the demon trying to get rid of?" Dad asked.

"The ghost," Yami said blankly, staring off into space again. "but he's not really a ghost."

"Ghost? What ghost was this?"

Yami shook his head.

"I don't know. But the demon didn't like the magic it was doing—"

"The ghost was trying to do magic on the demon?"

Yami nodded.

"I would think it was just a ghost, but my necklace burned."

Mom and Dad gave each other a serious look. After a moment, Dad turned back to Yami.

"Is there anything else that happened?"

Yami took a breath, tying to calm his shaking hands, and churning stomach. Again, he tried to speak…and again, nothing came. Finally, he let out the breath he didn't know he'd been holding, shaking his head.

"I don't know," he croaked. "I—I suddenly wasn't—here anymore…I was…I was being smashed into nothing, a—a—and—and not breathing, I was choking, and screaming, and the demon was behind me, I swear, and—" Yami swallowed; a lump had formed in his throat. Determined to finish his sentence, he closed his now wet eyes, and choked out,

"I thought I was gonna die—"

He broke down. Yami put the glass of water on the floor and hid his face in his hands. He then leaned over, curling into himself, trying to keep from making noise.

Somehow, admitting such a thought to his parents made it ten times worse for Yami. He was never one for suicidal thoughts—but what he had felt…it was what he had dreamed about in the deepest, most horrible of nightmares. The ones that no amount of detailing at next morning's breakfast could cure. The ones that made him feel helpless, worth nothing more than a neck for the demon to feed off of. The nightmares that made him feel less than human.

All the ones about the curse were like that. The curse was real. And until the chain was off his neck, he and his parents had known, in the back of their minds, that any one of them could become real.

Now they had.

For the first time in Yami's or his father's lifetime, the Demon had shown itself in this world. And even though it was only a feeling it had shown…it was enough.

It was enough to make Yami wish he hadn't regained consciousness.

"Here."

Yami looked up to see a box of Kleenex being held out to him, followed by a hand on his shoulder. Mom. He reached out and took a tissue, burying his face in that instead.

He needed to get a grip on himself. On a less serious level, this was just embarrassing. Here he was, seventeen, reduced to tears over a piece of jewelry. When Yami thought about it, plenty of people were afraid of being tortured within an inch of their life. It wasn't a fun thing to think about. But not everyone started bawling over it. Just him. He was the only man, to his knowledge, who had blubbered over the magnitude of the curse.

He'd even overheard Dad admitting to Mom one time that he didn't remember ever getting as frightened as Yami got, when the necklace acted up. Everyone else in the family just took it like it was, and moved on with their lives.

How many times had he tried to take the damn thing off? Even though he knew it wouldn't? After all, he'd burned his fingers so much he didn't have fingerprints on three of them, anymore. How dumb was that?

He remembered he would spend hours fighting the urge to let go of the clasp—just to see if maybe it would relent that time, after three thousand years of holding together. He remembered getting so close that he could actually feel his skin burning off, and the rest of the necklace start to heat up as a more dire warning. The minute he let go, though—everything returned to normal.

Maybe Yami was just pathetic. Yami finally took his hands and Kleenex down from his face. What an idiot he was, sometimes…

Yami sniffed again, readjusting the half-thawed ice pack. Suddenly, he had the overwhelming urge to go hide somewhere.

"I'm going to go upstairs," he said.

He didn't have anything else to say. He'd told them all he knew for sure about what had happened. Now, he just needed some time to think. Taking his shirt, Yami stood, threw the Kleenex away, and started to walk out of the room.

"This isn't as hard as you think it is," Dad said.

Yami paused.

"What are you talking about?"

"You're acting like this is all there is to your life. You wear the necklace, Yami. It doesn't wear you."

For a moment, Yami simply stood there in the doorway to the front hall, letting Dad's words work through his mind. Soon, though, the anecdote came to a barrier.

"So I bring a child into this world just to curse them? To watch them grow up learning that they can't have what they want out of life, because of who they are? Because of something I did to them?"

Yami turned back to Dad; he felt his eyes start to moisten again. _Idiot…_

"How long would it be before they got the idea that the only reason they were born was because of the piece of jewelry around their neck? How small will it make them feel, to know that they are second to something cold, and lifeless? How long will I have to watch them struggle against it, coming to face the reality that their life has been dictated for them? How can I stand by and watch them go through that! I'm not even in a relationship and I feel guilty—"

"How do you think I felt?"

Dad's tone silenced Yami.

"You refused to believe it was true," he said. His voice was quiet, and grave. "For years, you fought it. You still do. I was so sure at times that it would rebel against you and start choking you, or something…thankfully, it never has. Until now, anyway…" he added darkly, running a hand through his hair. Heaving a sigh, he continued,

"I didn't look forward to it, either. But, considering what would happen if I didn't…I realized I had to. Still…it's been one of the hardest things I've ever had to do."

Yami didn't know what to say to that. He never really thought about if Dad had gone through these same thoughts that plagued Yami now. But it made sense.

One of the hardest things he'd had to do…was it going to be the hardest thing that Yami would ever have to do?

He hoped to god it was. He couldn't imagine what could be harder than cursing an innocent child that's been looking up to you for the past ten years…

"I understand that it's unfair," Dad continued after a moment. "But it's not something I can change. It's not something any of us can change. Unless we want to unleash horrors on this world that are unimaginable, then…this is the only way to handle this. You don't have to struggle against it."

_But it's stifling me, _Yami thought. _I don't want this._

"I just…I don't want to hurt people anymore," Yami said out loud.

"You're not hurting them," Dad replied. "There's nothing you can do if someone touches the clasp. There was nothing you could do about what happened today; it just happened, right?"

Slowly, Yami nodded. It felt nice, to be told that it wasn't his fault. Even though he had a feeling he would keep on blaming himself, it still felt nice to hear the words. Maybe because they were true.

"It just happened. The ghost appeared…and I just…" Yami letft the sentence at that. They understood. Dad did, anyway.

"Plus," Yami said, voicing a sudden thought, "I don't really want all my friends' souls to get eaten."

"…What?" Dad asked. He seemed completely baffled.

"You know," Yami said, "That story about the guy whose friends' souls got eaten by the demon because he didn't want to pass the necklace on, and he was just thinking of not doing it?"

"You know," Dad said, after a pause, "I don't think I remember that one."

"…oh."

"It's good you remember that, though," he added. "It's been so long since I've read those…you've kept them up in your room for years, now."

"Yeah," Yami agreed, thinking of all the stories about the necklace that had been passed down through the ages. He was surprised that Dad didn't remember that story…

Then again, Yami had read all those stories countless times. Some of them didn't really make sense. Others were frightening to think about; a lot worse things had happened to others who had worn it. Nonetheless, he tried to remember them all.

Just for the sake of knowing.

Yami yawned.

"I'm going upstairs," he announced again. Though this time, the statement wasn't as desperate as before.

"All right," Dad replied with a nod. "Go sleep. But remember what I said about the curse."

Yami nodded, yawned, and walked out. He still ached, and he still felt horrible. But at least now, he could think about things without feeling like he was going to throw up. And that was improvement enough…

He took another glass of water with him as he went up the stairs, which now seemed a lot easier to climb. Huh. Must have been the stress.

In his room, Yami thought about what Dad had said. He'd never thought about it like that before…he'd never really thought about what Dad must have gone through. Although now that he'd listened, he felt selfish for not thinking of it before.

Although it wasn't a wonder that he thought like that; he and Bakura got into a fight because Yami couldn't tell him about_ his_ necklace. He and Kaiba were enemies because of _his _necklace. Well, partly—the other part was just because he was a complete jerk. But that was besides the point. Anzu got burned because of _his_ necklace. And Yugi's ghost...

Yami frowned, at that. How _did_ that ghost fit into all this? Why was it that, all the sudden, this ghost comes out of nowhere and tries to contact Yami, whom he's known about for a long time, and whom has been haunting Yugi since the beginning of the semester? Was some part of his curse was reaching out to Yugi?

But that didn't make sense…the curse was contained within the family. The only person affected by it was the person wearing the necklace…why would it throw itself to someone else? And who was this ghost in the first place? Was it someone that had worn the necklace as their own, years ago? He didn't look like he was wearing modern clothing…nothing from this century, anyway…or last century…when was the last time a culture let men wear robes and heaps of jewelry on their neck?

"Don't know," Yami muttered aloud, taking another sip of water. His first guess would be that it was the pharaoh, but Yami would think that something specific would have woken him. Yami hadn't tried to wake him, or anything…from wherever he was…all he'd done is try to take the thing off. And it wouldn't explain why he was hanging around Yugi.

Yami remembered what Yugi had told him about it, at the library.

"_It was trying…to contact you, when…you were choking. I don't know why, but it said…it said that you had to do with a lot of things. He sees you, but you can't see him."_

Someone who saw Yami, but whom Yami couldn't see…

Maybe generations ago, Yugi's family married into Yami's, and the spirit related to Yugi's was haunting him. It was only this semester that Yami met Yugi. Maybe the spirit was awakened, and was trying to get revenge on Yami's curse by attacking it.

Yami shook his head. This was just really confusing. Perhaps he was thinking about it too much.

Yami let out a small laugh. Usually, that wasn't a problem. More often than not, it was the other way around. Like with this whole math thing.

Ah, well.

Yami felt the heaviness of his fatigue take hold of him again, and he got off his desk chair and lay down in his bed, not bothering to take the top covers off. His skin was searing enough with pain, anyway. He had the thought that he should take some aspirin to make it less excruciating, and get another ice thingy to keep it cold…

But he had fallen asleep long before he could act on any of those thoughts.

* * *

He woke again to a soft, steady knocking on the door. Slowly he got up, making sure not to move his shoulders too much. He shuffled over to the door, and opened it to find Gramma sanding there, holding a large cup of tea.

"Your mother wanted me to bring this to you."

He could smell the cinnamon from here.

His favorite, she knew.

"Oh," he said, "…Thank you—ah!"

Yami managed to set it down on the table before he singed himself.

"It's fresh out of the pot," Gramma said. Yami nodded, shaking his hand vigorously.

"Thanks for the warning."

Gramma smiled, a little. But Yami could tell it was a strained one, and it was quickly wiped off, as she turned to walk out of the room again.

But just then, Yami remembered something.

"Hey, Gramma?"

"Yes?" She asked, pausing in the doorway.

Yami looked to the floor.

"When you wore the necklace…did you ever—um…see things?"

Gramma shut the door behind her with a quiet click, and turned around to face Yami again, eyeing him cautiously.

"What kinds of things?" She asked slowly.

Yami was suddenly aware that his hand was now entangling itself in the thin gold chain they both knew so well.

"Ghosts," he said simply.

Gramma was silent. Yami looked up to see her staring hard at the wall, frowning a little.

"I remember…" she trailed off, her eyes narrowing in their effort to see what she wanted them to. She shook her head. "It's been so long…"

"But you remember _some_ things, don't you?" Yami asked, a little more urgently than he intended. Gramma sighed.

"I don't remember seeing things…just—feeling them…"

"Like…someone else was there?"

Gramma nodded, slowly.

"Like someone else was there," she repeated. "Watching."

"Ack—" Yami absentmindedly said, as his fingers wrapped themselves up in the last of the chain, and it tightened around his neck. Gramma smiled, a little more warmly this time.

"I never did that, though," she said. "It's not a good habit to get into. Especially with the clasp."

"Yeah…"

There was another awkward silence, as Yami adjusted the necklace back to its normal position again.

"Well," Gramma finally said, nodding to the still steaming cup on Yami's desk, "There's your tea."

And she walked out of the room again, leaving Yami to his own very confused thoughts.

Though now he had something else to add to his mess of facts; a presence...

Was it the same one that had shown itself to Yami this afternoon? And why? Had some ghost been following his family around since he died? Or was it even a family member? If it wasn't…who was it? And how long had he been there, watching?

Yami frowned deeply, sinking into his desk chair as he watched his steaming tea absently, trying to figure out what it all meant...

* * *

Amir could hear his mother coming down the stairs from Yami's room. He clasped his hands together, waiting as she got settled in the armchair in front of the empty fireplace. When she had settled, Amir looked to her.

"How is he?"

"He seems like he's thinking very deeply about the curse," she replied.

Amir could feel Laura look to him.

"What do you think that means?"

He shrugged.

"It means he's thinking about the curse."

He meant to leave it at that. His mother went back to her reading, and Laura to hers. It was odd, how they did that.

He couldn't help but to mull over all that had happened that afternoon. And the conclusion that he came to was his grave announcement, into the silence of the early evening.

"I just hope he can get beyond this."

He could hear Laura put her book down. He had a feeling she really wasn't reading it anyway.

"I know," she said. "I really worry about him. Especially after today…"

"Yeah," Amir agreed.

"Right now, it's ruling his life," Laura continued. "Every time something happens to it, he just goes even further into himself. You notice the only real friend he's got is Bakura. He's isolating himself because he thinks that no one else will relate to him. It's hurting him."

"And that's what I don't understand," Amir said. "It was a duty to me. It was something that was just a part of my life. I had to do it." He held up his hands, "simple as that. Yami's making it extremely hard for himself. Harder than he needs to be making it."

"Maybe he is," Laura agreed, "But you have to remember that you never wondered if you were gay or not. Yami…is pretty much convinced that he is—even if he doesn't want to admit it."

Amir nodded. He knew perfectly well.

"Still…" he said, "I don't want him to miss out on life because of this. He's got so many things he could do with his life, but he doesn't see any of them because he's scared of the curse. I don't want him to live a future he doesn't want."

"None of us do," Laura said.

Amir looked over to see Mom nodding her head slowly in agreement.

* * *

Yami let the now completely thawed ice pack slip out of his hand and onto the floor.

How many other people in this world were beaten every day? How many people were raped, or tortured, or torn from their families? How many people lost their homes, or their loved ones? How many of them watched it happen?

How many of them didn't have a choice?

And here he was, crying about how he had to make a child, somehow. What, was he afraid that he might have something stable in his life? That he wouldn't make a good father? He could tell the woman about the necklace, anyway…Dad had to Mom. But that was after they were married. So it wasn't like it was a hard thing, at first; put the necklace on ten-year-old Yami, and tell him to never try to take it off. Big whoop.

Yami was the one who made it hard. Why did he have to make life difficult for everyone else? Why was he such a burden?

Maybe he should stop all this. He was seventeen. If he waited much longer, the Demon would start acting up again. He was out of time.

He couldn't hide anymore. He couldn't escape. And try as he might to believe otherwise, there was really no way out.

Besides…was it really that hard to go up to a girl and ask her out on a date? It's not like he'd ever tried before…

Yami sighed, and finished his now lukewarm tea.

Maybe he should start.

It wasn't like he could just spill all this to some girl—she'd probably think he was an absolute freak. Or a pervert.

Start slow. Just a date. Nothing more.

After all…what else was there to do?

* * *

A/N: So, there you are. Guess what you will. I am almost positive that I'll have another chapter up by the time I leave for school again. But, who knows? Life might get me again, haha.

I joke about that too much.

Anyway, review responses for those who left anonymous ones can be seen on my homepage (otherwise known as my LJ account), which is completely public.

Merry Christmas, from everyone here in Tremp's little world! Have a good one!


	25. Define Date

A/N: You know, with all this talk about curses and family secrets and such, I sometimes remind myself of Fruits Basket.

Agh! No! Plot demon! I've got too many of those already!

_(whips out bat)._

If you'll excuse me for a moment, I have some population control issues to take care of…

Chapter title: Define 'Date'.

* * *

"Yami? What happened to your neck?" 

Yami started, dropping his pencil in the process. He turned to Anzu, who was giving a very worried, very blatant look at his neck. Yami quickly yanked his shirt straight again, as it had apparently shifted just enough to the side for the redness to show.

"Oh! Sorry," Anzu apologized, whispering. "Does it have to do—"

"Yes," Yami interrupted, before Anzu could get it out. "I'll tell you after school, all right?"

Anzu nodded vigorously, turning forward again.

These attempts at secrecy, however, were thwarted; Frau Mueller had put her overhead pen down onto the transparency she had been writing on, and was watching Anzu and Yami's conversation silently. Along with the rest of the class.

"You don't have to wait until after school to say anything, Yami," Frau Mueller said. "I'm sure it's very important."

Trying to keep his calm, Yami cleared this throat.

"I just, um…burned my neck, is all," he said.

Frau Mueller's eyebrows went up.

"Burned your neck? Is it all right?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," Yami said—albeit a little too quickly, for Frau Mueller immediately asked,

"How did you burn it?"

"Erm…cooking accident," Yami said, "Um…I…spilled some hot oil on myself."

"Onto your _neck_?"

"Yeah, I got startled, and I kind of…sloshed it upwards."

Frau Mueller gave Yami a strange look. Then, shaking her head, she said,

"If I were your mother, I'd ban you from the kitchen."

"She did."

"Good!" Frau Mueller laughed. And silently, Yami let out his breath in relief. That was way too close for his liking. He appreciated the concern, but…he'd rather nothing had been said.

He should have worn that turtleneck. But it was painful as it was, having a long sleeved t-shirt on, with the burn healing. He was pretty sure it would scar, too.

Not like he had enough of those, right?

He hated his life, sometimes.

Wait—_some_times?

Yami opened his German book, and tried to focus on what Frau Mueller was telling them. Something about accusative prepositions…which sounded just charming.

* * *

Anzu and Yami ended up leaving the classroom at the same time, which Yami was sure was her doing—especially when she asked to walk home with him. 

"Don't you have dance practice?" Yami asked, frowning. "You always have dance practice."

"Not anymore—our performance was last weekend, so the fall session's over."

"…Oh," Yami said. "That ended kind of early."

Anzu shrugged.

"There's only a week of school left, after this. It's not that long until finals, and winter break."

"…really?"

"Yeah," Anzu replied, nodding, "that's why everyone's talking about wrapping things up in class? And reviewing?"

"…Oh…." Yami said. He was sure there was more than that…he shook his head.

"God, it seems like only a few weeks ago I was trying to find my way around this place."

"Well, technically, it was."

Yami rolled his eyes.

"I meant as in two, or something."

"Ah, I see."

Anzu shut her locker.

"So, are we walking home, or not? You were going to tell me about—"

"Yeah, I remember. I need to get some stuff out of my locker first, though. By the way," Yami added, turning to face Anzu, "Thanks for announcing to the world about my neck."

"It took me by surprise!" Anzu replied, defending herself, "It looks like a mountain range grew there overnight!"

"Oh, thanks," Yami replied flatly, continuing on again.

"It's true!" Anzu continued, catching up with him, "it looks really serious! That's why I asked if you were all right! And by the way you're acting, I'd say I was right to think you aren't!"

Yamis' pace slowed. It was only then he realized it had sped up.

"Come on," Anzu continued, "Get your stuff out of your locker, walk out of the school, and then when we can walk."

"Right," Yami replied, taking a long, deep breath. "Right…"

* * *

Once they were outside the school, Yami was struck with a sudden thought.

"Are you hungry?"

"…now that you mention it, I did forget to pack a lunch today," Anzu replied.

Yami raised his eyebrows.

"You haven't eaten since breakfast?"

"Since last night, actually," Anzu said. "I usually don't eat breakfast."

Yami stopped walking altogether and stared at her for a moment, appalled.

"How are you still _standing_!"

Anzu laughed.

"Sheer will power, Yami. Something many of us who _aren't_ teenage boys are equipped with."

"Hey!"

Anzu laughed again. Then, when she realized Yami still wasn't going anywhere, she said,

"Are we going home or not?"

"Well, I was just thinking…maybe we could sit down somewhere and talk. After all, it's pretty complicated."

After a moment, Anzu shrugged.

"Well, it's as good timing as any," she said.

"Huh?"

Anzu shrugged.

"My parents' anniversary is today, so they're spending the day out of the house. And judging how it usually goes, they won't be back until later this evening."

"Oh," Yami said. "Yeah, I guess so, then. Happy anniversary to them."

"I'll tell them that," Anzu said. Then,

"So, where are you thinking of stopping?"

Yami shrugged.

"Somewhere with food?"

"Sounds like a plan."

And so, they ended up going to a small place neither of them had been before that was cheap enough for both of them to afford.

"After you," Yami said, stepping aside while held open the front door for Anzu.

"Why, thank you," Anzu replied.

As she was walking inside, a woman passing by the restaurant caught Yami's eye, and smiled at him warmly—more than such a stranger usually would. It startled Yami somewhat, and he followed Anzu into the restaurant somewhat confused. Not that he should be confused about a kind smile from a middle aged woman, but still…it just seemed strange.

Yami shrugged, as the waitress came up to seat them. Maybe he reminded her of something. She probably saw him with Anzu. Maybe she thought they were together, or something. After all, this _did_ kinda look like a date—

Yami's eyes widened.

Date.

Girl.

Oh, my.

Suddenly, a loud whispering sound exploded out of the background noise. Looking to his left, Yami spotted a group of girls gossiping at one of the tables he and Anzu passed as they followed the waitress. One of them looked up as he went by, and, seeing that he was paying attention, ducked her head back down into the group. Seconds later, it became muted again.

"Huh…" Yami said aloud, without really thinking about it.

"What?"

Yami started. Anzu was giving him a strange look.

"Oh, um…" he glanced back at the girls, "I just…though I recognized someone. Sorry."

And it was true. They were the same girls from the place where Bakura and he had gone to, when Bakura had kidnapped him.

They probably thought he did this often, now. Not that he cared. To him, it just seemed odd that one would spend their time whispering in restaurants around town about people they knew.

But, to each his own.

"Here's your table." Blinking, Yami registered that there was a booth in front of them. He slid in one side while only half-listening to the waitress, as she said,

"My name is Carol, and I'll be your waitress this afternoon. Is there anything I can get you guys to drink?"

"Water's fine, thanks," Anzu replied. Yami agreed to the same.

When she had gone, the thought of how date like this really was sunk in with Yami. He had thought of asking Anzu out before. But whether it was out of a need to through the curse or actually wanting to for the sake of wanting to, he really didn't know.

He didn't know anything, anymore.

Before Yami had a chance to bog himself down in thoughts that were too depressing, he collected himself, and instead thought about the person sitting before him.

Anzu was…actually quite attractive, now that he looked. After he had the thought, he looked away. If anything, he didn't want to be uncomfortably outward about those kinds of things. He didn't want her to think he was some kind of sex-driven pervert, after all. Even though she knew he was far from that.

Right now, it seemed she thought Yami more strange than sick. Inwardly, Yami wondered if there was any difference between the two, sometimes.

"Yami?"

"Sorry," Yami apologized, blinking, "I'm just—"

"Thinking?" Anzu finished. Slowly, Yami nodded.

"Yeah, actually."

"That's good," Anzu said, "For a minute I thought your water glass was actually that interesting."

Yami looked down to see his hands were clutching the water very tightly.

"Yeah, I guess I _was_ staring at my glass…"

"Anyway," Anzu said, sitting forward in her chair, "I guess I can ask you now how you got the burn. It seems pretty bad."

"I thought that would be pretty obvious," Yami replied.

"Well, I know it was the necklace," Anzu stated. "If that's what you mean."

Slowly, Yami nodded.

"Yeah."

There was a pause. After a moment, Anzu said,

"…is that all? No…how, or why, or when?"

Yami started wiping the condensation off his water glass—what little there was of it, next to the cold window.

"I…still don't know what exactly happened."

"It just…started burning, then? Like when I touched it?"

"…Basically," Yami said, wondering how far he should go in telling her this. He didn't want to tell Anzu anything more about the curse than she already knew. After all, she really wasn't involved.

Then again…she kind of was. But it wasn't because she had gotten burned, and Yami had been forced to tell her about it. It was the fact that since then, Yami had kept on telling her things related to it. Like when he'd had that huge fight with his parents—she'd listened to him rant about that without question or complaint. Now, she knew more about it than anyone else outside of the family.

"Just…start talking," Anzu urged. "It'll come out eventually."

Yami looked at her, sitting forward in her seat, ready to listen once again to the seemingly impossible.

She would understand this. Perhaps more so than Yami could predict.

And so, Yami took a breath, and let whatever came to mind fall out of his mouth.

It turned out he had quite a lot to say. It was only interrupted when the waitress came back to take their orders. And by the time the food came, Yami was still talking.

"—so now, I only know that it was something to do with the demon, and that this ghost guy that's been haunting Yugi all semester apparently has the power to do something to the demon to want it to come out and kill it. Or at least harm it in some way, but still. So I'm thinking it's someone who had the necklace before, but I'm not sure. Although it really doesn't matter anyway, because there's no way I can get out of passing it on, so all of this thinking about it just useless anyway."

Yami sighed, and took a sip of his water; his throat had gotten a little dry.

"…What happens if you don't pass it on?" Anzu asked, after a moment.

Again, Yami hesitated. Now he was really treading on thin ice; these were things strictly forbidden from outside the family. At least, others had gotten punished for it in the past.

But somehow, it didn't really matter anymore. After all, with all that he'd done in the past with trying to take the necklace off, and trying to convince his parents he was gay…he was probably going to be punished for all that already. The demon wasn't very forgiving to those whom had aggravated it. What were a few more broken rules now?

"…Basically, the demon comes out and wreaks havoc on the world until it either dies, or it runs out of people and feelings to feed on. Whichever comes first. It's supposed to be this ancient evil that's more powerful than any other, blah blah blah."

Anzu gave Yami a strange look.

"Blah blah blah?" she repeated.

"Well, it's what every fantasy story has—an evil something that's seemingly undefeatable. I just didn't think I needed to give the whole spiel."

"Ah, I see." Anzu nodded, eyes traveling to the window. Then, she asked,

"So it feeds on feelings?"

Yami nodded, looking out of the window next to their table to see a wonderful view of the restaurant's parking lot.

"It's been feeding off of feelings in this world to keep itself alive. Apparently wherever it lives doesn't feed it. Or maybe it's cursed to only feed off of my family. I don't know."

"Ah."

A silence settled over them, after that. Strangely, it wasn't awkward at all. Not like Yami thought it would be, after such a conversation. Instead they sat in a comfortable passiveness, marred only by the dull restaurant chatter around them.

After a while, Anzu spoke again, her expression thoughtful.

"So…instead of the demon coming out and causing death and destruction, you have to pass it on? To whom?"

"A 'child of my own blood'," Yami said, air quoting.

Suddenly, a dawning of comprehension spread over Anzu's face.

"So _that's_ why you don't like people knowing you're gay!" she exclaimed, "I get it now."

Yami nodded.

"Because it really doesn't matter in the end," he said, "I still have to do this, no matter what."

Anzu frowned.

"But…you just have to have a kid, right?"

"Tuh! _Just_?" Yami said.

Anzu rolled her eyes.

"What I meant was that there's nothing in the curse saying that you have to actually like the person you have the child with, or anything?"

Yami almost dropped the glass he was holding.

"Anzu!"

"What?" Anzu asked.

"Well what am I supposed to do, walk up to someone and ask if I can borrow their uterus for nine months!"

Anzu stared at Yami for a moment. Then, she burst out laughing—harder than Yami had ever seen her laugh before. It made people stare.

"I'm serious!" Yami insisted, resisting the urge to laugh himself, "I can't take this lightly!"

"I'm sorry!" Anzu gasped, "It's just your expression when you said that was—" She broke down laughing again. Yami shook his head.

"Yes, Anzu, as a matter of fact I was wondering if you'd be willing to part with yours for a couple months."

"Sure," Anzu said, through laughs, "I'll even add an egg as a bonus."

"…That just makes my day," Yami replied flatly, "Really."

"Here, lemme just whip it out—"

"—Okay, now that's just disgusting."

Anzu took a breath to calm herself down.

"Oh, my…" She cleared her throat, "That was fun."

"That was _bizarre_."

"You started it."

"…I didn't suggest yanking out my own organs."

"Well, how else do you expect to borrow them?"

Yami didn't answer that. Instead, he settled for a strange look. Which caused Anzu to laugh a little more.

"So, back to this curse…" Yami said, after a moment. "I think you were telling me something."

"Yes," Anzu said, regaining her serious tone, "What I was going to say before that was that there is actually a gray area between marrying someone and randomly asking them for their uterus—"

"—And I can guarantee that I have heard them before."

"I'm not saying you haven't," she said, "I'm just saying that maybe you need to think about some of them."

Yami raised an eyebrow, skeptical. Nonetheless, he said,

"All right. What do you have in mind?"

"Well," Anzu said, "There's always just donating sperm, and letting some other couple who can't reproduce on their own use it. But then there's the passing on bit…oh."

"Wow, I _never _thought of that one."

"Well, maybe when you find someone you trust you can tell them all this and they can agree to…curse their child…"

"_That's _going to work."

Anzu shook her head.

"Well then what _are_ you planning on doing? Marrying someone and _then_ telling her?"

Yami sighed.

"Honestly, I don't know," he admitted. "That's the only thing I can see doing. But it would be more fair to just tell her before. But then she might not want to go through with it. And this is assuming I find someone who really likes me like that. And what about honesty? What if she thinks I'm just pretending so that I can pass this on? How will she know what the truth is? Especially when I'm pretty sure I'm gay, even though I can't be? I just…I don't know what I'm going to do."

Yami felt Anzu's eyes on him.

"What?"

"You just…look really down about this, that's all," Anzu said. "I feel bad."

Yami gave her a strange look.

"Why do _you_ have any reason to feel bad?"

"Well," Anzu shrugged, "It's a depressing subject, and I started asking about it."

"No…" Yami said, looking out the window again, "I wouldn't have said anything if…"

"…if what?"

"…I don't know why I did, actually."

"…oh."

Another silence passed between them. This time, Yami felt an uneasiness hanging between them.

"You know," Yami said, with a little laugh, "it's probably because you're not freaking out about all of this. I just keep telling you more, and you never question my sanity. Or if I'm telling the truth or not. Either that, or you're really good at hiding the fact that you do think I'm a nut."

Anzu smiled crookedly, at that.

"Well, Yami," she said, "I probably would think you were nuts if I hadn't had two weeks to stare at the burns I got from your necklace. And you don't seem like you're acting at all—I have a feeling I would know if you were trying to convince me of something. You don't hide yourself that well—even though you need to, sometimes, because of the curse. Besides," she added, "for me…seeing is believing."

As much as Yami wanted to believe what she was saying, it was too much to believe that Anzu was as unaffected by this conversation as she seemed to be now. Here they were, discussing a curse, and she carried on like she would a normal conversation.

Yami remembered when she had first found out about the necklace. It seemed like ages ago, now, when Yami was still new to Domino High. She had acted the same way then, too—calm, and collected.

It completely baffled Yami.

"But," he protested, "Doesn't it bother you at all? All this stuff about demons from another dimension, and curses and all the rest of it?"

Anzu shook her head.

"The only thing I'm worried about is your getting out of this mess in one piece."

Suddenly, Yami was reminded of what Bakura had said, after their last outing:

"_I know I never say this, but after what you told me…I have a feeling there are a lot darker things behind all this than you're giving Kaiba credit for. And you're my best friend. Just…be careful, all right? Don't pull something stupid on me."_

Yeah, there were darker things than Bakura knew about Kaiba. There were darker things about Yami that he kept to himself.

Well—until now.

Yami found it odd that he had spent so much energy trying to keep Bakura in the dark about all this, and yet Anzu got the privilege to know all. She just…seemed to lend herself to that kind of thing—listening to others' problems. She was very good at it.

They ate the rest of their meal in relative silence, only talking occasionally about mundane things. Anzu then looked at her watch, and realized she still had homework to do. Yami admitted that he should probably be getting home too. He didn't mention that his parents had no idea where he was, right now—after all, he was supposed to come straight home that day.

Ah, well. He'd deal with it when he got there.

And so, he and Anzu paid for their food and left, starting on the trek back to their neighborhood. About five minutes after they had left the restaurant, Anzu suddenly said,

"…Maybe it's time to look at it a different way."

Yami's pace slowed slightly.

"Huh?"

"The curse, I mean," Anzu said.

For a moment, Yami just stared at incredulously at Anzu.

"What?" Anzu asked.

"This has been cursed around my family's neck for three thousand years," Yami stated, pulling the chain out from under his collar, "There _is_ no other way to look at it. Every other way has been tried, and they all lead to the same necklace with the same curse."

"How do you know?" Anzu replied, "You said so yourself that this whole thing that happened with you and Yugi was the first time that had happened in centuries. Maybe that ghost was trying to tell you something."

But Yami was still shaking his head.

"Even if it is," he said, "it wouldn't matter. If I don't pass it on, then the demon will be forced out into this world. There's no way I can hold it back—I don't even know what it's made of. It comes from some other dimension that the priest of the pharaoh summoned with his magic whose origins are now completely lost. So it wouldn't help getting my hopes up about something I can't get rid of. I'm just stuck."

"I'm not saying you should try to get rid of it," Anzu said, "I'm just saying it's very stupid to try and ignore something that gave you a third degree burn around your neck—"

"—It's not third degree—"

"That's no the point!" Anzu snapped. Yami shut his mouth, startled. After all, he had never heard Anzu raise her voice before.

"What if this was the sign the demon gave you before really hurting you? What if this happens again, and you don't know something that you could have found out, but didn't want to?"

Yami was silent. She had a point.

"This concerns the rest of your life," Anzu went on. "Why not find out everything you can about it? You know Yugi didn't give you all the answers. Maybe he's involved somehow. And if there's anyone else that knows things about it that you don't, then ask them. Get all the information you can, so you at least have an idea of what might happen next. Prepare yourself. It's stupid not to."

Yami thought of the papers his Dad had given him, when he had been given the necklace. All those stories about what had happened to his ancestors since the times of ancient Egypt…he'd read them over so many times, had memorized them, forgotten them, reread them…like a favorite book from childhood that one didn't want to forget. He had a feeling sometimes he knew those stories better than anyone else had cared to.

And yet they were just that—stories. Sure, they clued into what the Demon was capable of doing, but that's as far as it went. It recorded the suffering that everyone had gone through. That was all. As for the workings of the curse….

"Heh," Yami laughed darkly, struck with a thought, "The only other person that might know something I don't besides Yugi is Kaiba. And there's no chance in hell I'm asking _him_ anything."

"Why not?" Anzu asked.

"Well, considering he threatened to set the demon on me freshmen year and then told me that he really didn't know how to in the first place really makes me suspicious of his willingness to tell me the truth."

"Wait," Anzu asked, confused, "He what?"

Yami sighed.

"Freshmen year, he threatened to set the demon on me. And then, earlier this semester, he tells me that he really just did it to get me to stop bugging him and that he really doesn't know how to in the first place."

"Wait…so he can…how can he set the demon on you?"

Yami paused. He hadn't mentioned Kaiba throughout all his babble in the restaurant…she didn't know anything about his connection to the curse.

"Well," Yami said, "That kinda involves how this whole mess got started…"

Anzu shrugged.

"All right," She said. "We could walk more slowly."

Yami nodded.

"Now, I'm not going to tell it the long way, because that would take forever…but the short version is this:

"There was an ancient Egyptian Pharaoh who had this priest working under his rule who was really powerful. The priest was the Pharaoh's cousin, and they grew up together. They were really good friends. Then, to reasons that have been lost in history, the priest apparently got really angry at the pharaoh for something, and decided that he deserved to be punished.

"So, he went to his little library of magical books, and found something that would really make the pharaoh suffer—a demon from another world that fed off of feelings. So the priest summoned the demon, using his own intense hate for the pharaoh to convince it to come to Egypt. And then, it was set loose on Egypt. Of course, nothing could stop it as it ate hundreds of people and destroyed the houses of hundreds more. No one knew what it was. And the priest didn't let on that he was the one that did it—not for three days.

"Then, at the end of the three days, the Pharaoh was completely at a loss as to what to do. The priest admitted to what he had done, and presented the pharaoh with two options; one was that he could let the demon run amok in this world until it was bored with it, and decided to go back into its own world. But that didn't seem likely to happen anytime soon.

"The second option was that the demon be banished back to its own world, but on one condition—that someone block the passageway it came out of so that it couldn't come back. The Pharaoh chose the second option, and the priest conjured a physical object to represent the passageway. That object was this necklace," Yami pulled the necklace out from under his shirt, where it glistened in the late afternoon sun. "Then, the priest came back to the pharaoh, and told him that someone would have to spend eternity guarding the way to this world. The pharaoh chose to put himself in that place. So, the priest ripped the pharaoh's soul from his body, and trapped it in the gateway to the other dimension.

"The part about this whole thing that the priest didn't tell the pharaoh was that the demon, after seeing what it had of this world, didn't want to leave. So from that day onward, the demon tried to get whatever it could out of this world. But the only ones it could reach were the pharaoh who guarded it, and the priest who had brought it here. No one else, unless they were either touched by the necklace or descended from those two souls, would be affected by it. So ever since then, it's been feeding off of the families descended from the priest and the pharaoh. Obviously, I'm descended from the pharaoh. The Kaiba family is descended from the priest."

In the silence that followed Yami's narration, he carefully put the necklace back under his shirt, wincing as he lifted his arms to put it there; the burn still made it hard for Yami to move about freely.

"…wow…" Anzu said, after a while. "So Kaiba was claiming that he could control the demon somehow…and then he told you that he just did it to scare you away from him?"

"Yeah, that's pretty much it," Yami said. "So now I have no chance at getting anything out of him. Even if he does know something and has been keeping it from my family all this time, he wouldn't just tell me about it now. He has no reason to."

"So…even after thousands of years, there's still a rivalry between your and his family?"

"Well," Yami said, "I wouldn't call it a 'rivalry'. More like a fear that there are still powers the Kaibas have from the priest. After all, he was pretty powerful. And bloodlines go a long way. Plus," he added, "They haven't been very nice to us. For pretty much the entire time between then and now, they've been trying to find ways to make our lives even more miserable."

"I see," Anzu said, "So…Kaiba's just doing the same thing?"

Yami nodded.

"Yeah. 'cept when he told me he didn't know how…that was confusing…"

"How so?"

"Well, I mean, think about it," Yami said, squinting thoughtfully at the houses in front of them, "His family's been just horrible to mine for the longest time. His dad wasn't any different. I didn't even know he was the priest's descendent until he threatened me, freshmen year. He was suddenly looking really depressed, and we were kind of friends before, so I was naturally just wondering what was up. I guess I bugged him too much, or something, because all the sudden he snapped at me one day about the necklace and all that, and told me to leave him alone. I freaked out, and that was that. I learned from someone else what had happened after he left the school—he just kind of walked out one day and didn't come back. Apparently his dad and brother had died in a car accident that year."

"That's sad," Anzu said.

"Yeah," Yami admitted, "But he still didn't have to scare me like that…for three years he just left me like that! Three! And then he suddenly comes up to me this semester and tells me that really, I've been worrying about nothing for all this time. What kind of shit is that?"

"Well," Anzu said slowly, "Knowing what I do of Kaiba, I'd say that he did that so he wouldn't have to talk about his father and brother dying. Obviously it hit him hard. Maybe he just wanted to deal with it on his own. It's really hard for people to accept help. And that's essentially what you were offering him—someone to talk to. But he was confused, and just didn't want to deal with it, at the time. And maybe now he just wanted to make amends."

Again, Yami found himself staring incredulously at Anzu.

"…How do you _do_ that?"

"Do what?" Anzu asked.

"You sound like you know him."

Anzu rolled her eyes.

"I have lit with him, remember? I've watched him a lot over the semester."

"...Oh." Yami was suddenly reminded of Yugi. He frowned, at that thought. Hadn't he thought that before?

"And even if I didn't," Anzu continued, "That wouldn't be a hard conclusion to come to."

"…really? I never know with Kaiba."

"So Kaiba's not susceptible to the same set of emotions we classify as human?"

Yami shook his head.

"No, not really."

"I think you're just making this a lot harder than it really is. You're being too hard on him."

"So how come whenever I talk to him, he finds every opportunity he can to get me irritated? Pretty soon we're just fighting about random things that don't even matter, even when I approach him to talk about something serious. It just…explodes, for some reason."

"…So in other words, he knows how to push your buttons."

"What!" Yami exclaimed, causing Anzu to jump, "He does not! Why are you smirking like that!"

Anzu straightened her face.

"All right, he doesn't know how to push your buttons," she said. "Let's just say he's very perceptive."

"Perceptive my ass…" Yami muttered darkly, "More like a big jerk…"

Little did Yami know that Anzu was trying very hard at that moment to keep from laughing out loud.

At this point, they had made it to where they needed to split and go down their separate streets. Anzu calmed herself again, and turned to Yami.

"Well," she said, "I guess this is my turn."

"Huh?" Yami blinked. "Oh, wow…that didn't take long…"

"Well, it depends on what you mean by long."

"What time is it?"

"It's been about four hours since school got out."

Yami's eyes widened. Could he see a grounding in his future? Ooh, yes, he could…

"Well," Anzu said, with a sigh, "there's one thing I've learned from all this."

"What's that?"

"There's a lot about you I don't know. And," she shrugged, "who knows? You don't know everything about the curse. Maybe there's a loophole that's been kept from your family all these years that Kaiba's family knows about. He's willing to talk to you, at least; it wouldn't hurt to try and ask."

"…Yeah, I guess it wouldn't…" Yami admitted grudgingly.

"The only thing keeping you from this is you, you know."

Yami turned to Anzu.

"What do you mean by that?"

"A necklace is just a necklace," Anzu said, "It's you who can make your life a heaven or hell. Right now, you've built up all these reasons not to do things that might make a big difference in your life. You're confining yourself more than the demon ever could."

Yami stood for a moment, thinking….that was a really good point.

How come he'd never thought of that before?

"We should do this more often," Anzu said, "That was fun."

"Yeah," Yami said, yanking himself out of his reverie. Then, he said,

"Not that this really counts as hanging out, but there's a basketball game between us and Dalton this coming weekend. You could come and watch."

"Yeah," Anzu agreed, "Even though I don't know anything about it."

"Eh, doesn't matter," Yami said, "Half the people going don't know that much either."

Anzu laughed.

"Really?"

Yami shrugged.

"That's the impression I get, sometimes."

"I guess you don't have many people show up, then?"

"Yeah, the crowd gets kinda slim, sometimes."

"Well, I'll see if I can come, then. When is it?"

"Seven at the new gym."

"On Friday?"

"Yep."

"Okay," Anzu said. "I don't think I'm doing anything that night, either."

"Cool. So, I guess I'll see you in German tomorrow."

"Unless I get run over, or something."

"…In which case I'll probably see you on the way to school, because we walk the same way."

"true," Anzu replied. "If I'm still conscious, I'll wave 'hi'."

"…you're morbid," Yami said, turning and starting to walk down the street.

"You went along with it!" Anzu replied. Then, after a few moments, she added, "Don't forget what I said about Kaiba!"

"Right, right…"

Personally, Yami couldn't see how he could forget anything she had said. It was so new to him, hearing somebody talk about the curse in such a way that it was simple, and clear. It hadn't seemed that way at all before.

Now, all he had to do was ask Kaiba about what he knew. Yami groaned. This would be a trip…

But Anzu was right; it was now or never, really. He might not have this opportunity later.

Yami sighed.

Guess he'd just have to handle whatever Kaiba threw at him, and aim for the best.

Desperate times called for desperate measures.

* * *

A/N: Hrmm, Anzu with a dark sense of humor. That was an interesting development. 

And don't worry, Yami's still gay, and he'll still end up with a man, somewhere along the line…

Just in case you were wondering.

Hopefully next chapter will be up a little sooner than this one was, in relation to last time…I was surprised that this took practically the whole day—from about nine until four in the afternoon. I guess that explains why I don't get them out that often.

Ah, well. All in a day's work.


	26. Hidden

A/N: I apologize, to those of you who are wondering about Joey. He'll come up, and I assure you it will be interesting. It'll take a while, though.

Until then—Kaiba! And Yami!

In the same chapter!

Oh, my!

Chapter title: Hidden

* * *

It was true that Yami didn't know much about Kaiba's side of the curse. He had never really thought that Kaiba might _have_ a side to talk about, quite honestly; Kaiba had always been someone Yami had cared not to think about all that much. Ever since Kaiba had labeled himself as essentially a killer, in Yami's eyes, Yami had tried to push the dangers of knowing someone so extreme out of his mind by simply not thinking about him.

Although all that agonizing apparently didn't matter anymore—Kaiba was simply pissed off that day, three years ago.

Yami's fist clenched more tightly around the book he was carrying, and he felt his temper start to flare. That was such a lame excuse. How could that even be _considered_ a possible reason? After all, it didn't make that much sense to use that serious of a threat, even out of desperation.

Then again, Yami really didn't know how Kaiba's mind worked, anyway. So who was he to judge?

He shook his head.

And here Yami was, about to walk out of the blue to ask about that which Yami personally had always been so evasive in mentioning even in the slightest sense.

Yeah, Yami had resolved to do it. He was going to ask Kaiba what he knew about the curse. At least, he _thought_ he did. Yami really didn't know if he'd walk away with any decent information, knowing how things usually went.

He had resolved to try. Yes, that sounded good. It wasn't as definitive…

Yami rolled his eyes. He didn't know why he was even bothering…

Oh, yeah. The rest of his life might depend on something Kaiba might tell him. Dammit, it wasn't even a guarantee! This all might be for nothing…

Yami's pace slowed, as he spotted Kaiba at his locker.

Suddenly, he just didn't feel like going on any further. He wished the bell would ring for homeroom to start. Then he wouldn't have to deal with this mess right now. It would be a relief, really…

But then Yami thought—as he had a zillion times before—that postponing the encounter wouldn't solve anything. It would simply put it off so that Yami would have time to convince himself all over again that asking Kaiba would be more of a good thing than a bad. And then, after much agonizing, he'd be back at square one, standing a good ten feet from Kaiba, willing himself to go on with it.

And the really depressing thing was that the whole situation was reminding Yami strongly of a shy schoolgirl trying to ask out her crush—

Yami visibly jumped as the thought fully hit him, causing some passersby to stare at him strangely. That was just too nightmarish of a thought to even comprehend… and his acting like _that_ was just…sickening! _Kaiba,_ of all people! _Ick!_

Thus, Yami moved forward.

Kaiba was just straightening, and moving to shut his locker. Perfect. He could catch him while walking—

"AGH!"

Yami felt something hit him in the side, and he slammed into the floor of the hallway, shoulder-first, wrenching the burnt skin around his neck. Riddled immediately with pain from his still healing burn, he rolled onto his knees, holding his neck with both hands.

"_Ow…."_

Someone gasped.

"Ohmigod, I'm so sorry! Are you all right?"

Yami looked up to see a girl he didn't recognize kneeling next to him. Looking beyond, Yami saw that Kaiba's locker was now abandoned. He'd walked away.

_Dammit!_

"Are you all right?" The girl asked again, her voice rising in pitch.

"Oh, yeah. I've never felt better, actually. Severe burns just feel wonderful when they're wrenched around."

"Omigod, I didn't know, I'm sorry! I didn't see you back there—"

"Don't worry, I'm fine," Yami cut her off.

"No, seriously, I didn't know—"

"So you just randomly bump into people on purpose?" Yami snapped.

"No!" the girl exclaimed, sounding annoyed, "I was just apologizing!"

"All right, your conscious is cleared now, so you can leave me alone!" Yami said, noticing a little too late that he was shouting.

A silence passed, and the girl stood.

"Well _sorry_ for wanting to help!" she said, before turning and stalking off.

Yami would have responded to that, if he had been feeling a bit meaner. He hadn't meant to snap at her in the first place. But the frustration of having all that agonizing having been for nothing, added with the unexpected pain of the burn getting hit like that just wasn't sitting well at all. He got up, trying not to aggravate the burn too much as he retrieved his book.

"_dammit_…."

Now he'd have to keep his shoulders as stiff as possible all day—

"Courteous much?"

Yami jumped for the second time that morning, and he turned to see who had jerked him out of his thoughts.

It would have been too good of a thing for Kaiba to have walked away from all that. No, he had to have obviously watched the whole thing from some corner that Yami couldn't detect him hiding in. Wonderful.

What was worse was the fact that Kaiba seemed to be amused.

"Oh, yeah, that was just fucking hilarious." Yami snapped, "Pardon me while I go laugh my ass off."

"You'd have to have one first for that."

"What—? You—!"

"You were trying to get my attention before she ran into you," Kaiba interrupted.

"Don't change the subject like that!" Yami exclaimed, "You think you can just insult me and then move on to something else without my noticing!"

"It was worth a try," Kaiba replied, raising his eyebrow. "Besides, it wasn't even an insult. You should be used to the fact that you don't have much of anything, by now."

"Oh, _really_?" Yami said, taking a step towards Kaiba.

Kaiba looked Yami up and down.

"No," he replied, eyes lingering a little lower than Yami felt remotely comfortable with. "How else would you fit into those pants you wear all the time?"

Yami didn't even respond to that. Instead, he focused on throwing the hardest punch he could direct at Kaiba's face. But Kaiba saw it coming, quick as Yami was; he stopped Yami's fist in midair, saying,

"Careful, Yami; school hasn't even started yet, and you've already got one detention under your belt this semester."

"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't _shove your head up your ass_!" Yami shouted, causing the traffic in the hallway to slow, somewhat.

"I just did, you dimwit," Kaiba replied. He then shoved Yami's fist away, forcing Yami back a step from the force. Then, seeing the commotion they'd caused, he said, "Now, I know you had something to say before you got knocked over. And considering you think I'm something like the black plague, I figured it must be serious. Otherwise I would have left long ago."

Yami took a calming breath. That's right. Curse…Necklace…Dammit! He couldn't think straight anymore! That _bastard_!

Nonetheless, Yami collected himself enough to force out,

"Yes, it is serious. I wanted to ask you about the—the thing that burned my neck like this," Yami substituted, pulling aside his shirt to reveal the now reddened burn.

Kaiba's eyes narrowed, and his expression turned impassive.

"You didn't do that yourself?" he asked, his tone more serious.

"No, I didn't do it myself!" Yami snapped. "I would have stopped before it got to this!"

"Well, how was I supposed to know that?" Kaiba snapped back, anger flashing in his eyes. "And how am I supposed to know what did that, anyway?"

"I'm not asking you about what did it, I want to—" Yami cast an eye about them; things had stared moving along again, now that there wasn't a fight imminent. Some people were lingering, though.

Yami stepped forward again and lowered his voice, saying,

"I want to just ask you about the curse. I used 'what burned me here' as a code, but obviously you're not smart enough to get it!"

Kaiba raised an eyebrow.

"Not smart enough?" He asked, matching Yami's voice level, "This is coming from the math whiz of the century?"

Yami sighed angrily.

"I just wanted some information, all right! Something no one else can tell me but you! That's why I'm even talking to you in the first place!"

The expression on Kaiba's face went from sarcastic to surprise.

"Yami Atemuryoku, coming to Seto Kaiba to ask him something? I think this might just cause the universe to collapse."

"Oh, shut up," Yami snapped, shooting another acrid glare at Kaiba.

"How am I supposed to answer your great question, then?"

"Just—"Yami stopped after that; he was at a loss for words, in this state. This wasn't getting anywhere. He was too frustrated, and all he could focus on was that punch Kaiba had stopped. Had they not been in school, Yami would have beaten Kaiba's ass already. But he was in the middle of Domino high's hallway, with, as Kaiba put it, one detention under his belt.

And so, he threw up his hands.

"All right, fine!" he said, "Forget I said anything!"

And with that, he turned on his heel and made to walk off. But he had only gotten two paces along when Kaiba said,

"With your temper, you don't really need a curse in the first place, do you?"

Yami froze. Had he _really_ just used the word 'curse' out in the middle of a hallway in _a loud voice_ seconds before homeroom started? The _idiot!_

"If you wanted to ask me about what I knew about the curse that you might not, you just had to ask. After all," Kaiba added, after a moment, "some people can get along in life perfectly fine by just being blunt."

Yami recognized that phrase…There was little about their last meeting that Yami didn't forget. What surprised him was that Kaiba remembered what Yami had said to him.

He turned around.

"That's what I was trying to say," he replied. "But you stopped me before I got a chance to get the whole thing out."

Kaiba shook his head.

"Well, now we know what you were blabbering about. I'm sure that's more than a lot of people can say when they walk away from you."

Yami bit his tongue, much as he wanted to point out that it had been _Kaiba _that had started the fight with that stupid tight pants remark…. Instead, he settled for giving Kaiba a glare.

Kaiba gave out a laugh.

"You must really want me to tell you something," he said, "You're not even defending yourself anymore."

"_I_," Yami replied, "am just trying to keep things civil."

"That's a first."

"Are you going to tell me anything or not?" Yami snapped, the edge coming back into his voice.

Kaiba didn't answer. After staring at Yami for a few moments, he simply turned around and started to walk off.

Yami blinked, surprised by the sudden action.

"…I'll take that as a no!" Yami shouted after him. Kaiba turned around, and stopped.

"It's only a no if homeroom's more important," he said. Yami frowned. What—?

The bell rang.

"…oh."

"So are you coming or not?"

Yami frowned, approaching Kaiba cautiously.

"…Where are we going?"

"Outside," Kaiba replied, continuing to walk once Yami had caught up. "You don't want anyone to hear this, right?"

"N—No, not…really," Yami replied, somewhat stunned.

And so, he followed as Kaiba through an intricate maze of completely deserted halls Yami had never seen before, finally ending up outside, on a side of the school Yami had never seen before. It was a nice little indent in the school; a right angle made by what seemed like an extension of the school added on after the original building had been built. Yami knew Domino High was kind of old. To be frank, it was like an institutionalized version of a patchwork quilt made from really ugly fabric.

When they got to the corner, Kaiba immediately leaned against one wall, and pulled out a pack of cigarettes from his pocket. Yami inwardly groaned; the smoke from those things could scrape his throat up better than sandpaper could.

"So," Kaiba said, after lighting his cigarette, "You want to know something about the curse that only I can tell you."

Yami nodded, leaning against the other wall. The way he was facing gave a nice view of downtown Domino that Yami didn't think one could see, from the school.

"…Do you assume that my family's kept information from yours for all this time?"

Yami shrugged.

"It's a logical conclusion."

"And we've bee just waiting for you to come to us and ask about it? That's the most original idea I've ever heard. I do believe you've broken the curse."

Yami shot Kaiba a glare.

"I just came to ask," He said, "I don't care what you think of it, or how many sarcastic insults you want to throw at me in the process. I just want to know if there is something I don't know, or if there isn't. That's _all_."

"That's comforting," Kaiba replied.

"It should be!" Yami snapped, feeling his efforts to keep calm ebbing quite quickly, "At least I'm not after your life!"

"Oh, but I never know with _you_," Kaiba replied, his tone turning sarcastic, "You're _Yami_. I should expect anything from you."

That earned another glare.

"Very funny," Yami replied, recognizing the line of logic as his own towards Kaiba.

"_I_ don't see what's funny about it," Kaiba said, taking another draw from his cigarette.

"Don't even _try_ to pretend I just did that to you without reason!" Yami yelled, taking a step towards Kaiba, "I—"

"There are a few things you don't know."

Yami blinked. There he was, changing tracks again! Why did he keep doing that? "But they're only recent."

"…recent?" Yami asked, bewildered.

Kaiba shifted in his stance—almost uncomfortably. When he spoke again, his voice was much quieter, and there was no harshness about it.

"My…my father was very smart," he said. "He figured out a few things. The pieces were there all along, but… no one ever cared to look at them, before him. I think they were all afraid to."

Yami was silent, as he wasn't quite sure he'd heard that right. Had Kaiba really just talked about his father? His father, whose death caused Kaiba to lash out and threaten to kill Yami for wanting to know what was going on?

This wasn't computing. Sure, that was three years ago, but…Kaiba was still Kaiba. He still was as unpredictable as ever—perhaps even more so, now. And why was he so willing to help? There had to be some catch behind this…

"…is that all you need to know?"

Yami blinked, and looked to Kaiba. He had that impassive expression on his face again.

"…No," Yami replied, after a moment, "I…kind of need to know what it is your father found out in order for it to help with anything."

Kaiba looked away.

"I'd…have to remember, exactly. I know the gist of it, but I don't know how to explain it. I don't want to say anything and then find out it was false."

Yami simply stared at Kaiba. First he talks about what he'd threatened to kill Yami over three years ago, and then he was…_helping_? Sure, that's what Yami wanted to know, but he wasn't expecting to actually _get_ somewhere…

"You're not the only one that wants this solved," Kaiba said suddenly.

Yami frowned.

"Solved?" He asked. Kaiba looked to Yami.

"I thought you were trying to figure out a way to break it."

Slowly, Yami shook his head.

"I don't think it'll be solved."

"…Really?"

"There's nothing I can do," Yami said, "Everything I do, I'm either punished for or not punished for, depending on how the demon's feeling. There aren't any loopholes, or anything—

"Are you reading translations?"

Yami blinked.

"…Are you suggesting I go back to the oldest copies of the accounts of the curse I can find and translate them?"

"Well, there could be a translation error, or something—

"All the old copies have either aged beyond recognition, or they've gotten burned in the archives that one of my Dad's relatives was keeping, centuries ago. The day after he passed the necklace on, he died in the same fire that burned all the old texts relating to the curse that he'd been saving there. All we have now are the versions I have, and the original itself. It's been checked with the translation, and it's pretty accurate—the parts that are still readable. The only things different about the original and the latest version are the stories of those that have worn the necklace in between then and now."

"…oh," Kaiba said.

"That's what I mean, about not seeing it being solved," Yami continued. "Every way out has been sealed by the demon over all this time. It's had a lot of time to think about any possible way out. There probably could have been a way out of this mess that someone could have figured out from the start. But they were all afraid to. Now, we're all _still_ afraid, three thousand years later. And we're still cursed."

"…are _you _afraid?" Kaiba asked quietly.

"I…I don't really know, anymore," Yami admitted, after a pause. "I have been for the longest time, but..." He shook his head. "I think I've just given up on trying to live past when I take it off. I've resisted too much."

"You think the demon's going to kill you?"

Slowly, Yami nodded.

"Yeah—"

"How do you know?"

Yami didn't answer; he was too startled by the comment. Kaiba threw the last of his cigarette onto the pavement.

"You don't know what's going to happen," he said. "So don't pretend you do."

Yami stared at Kaiba, completely and utterly baffled. _What was going on!_

"I—I guess I _wouldn't_ know," he admitted. "But…even if I don't know, it's still pretty likely. More than likely."

"It's still not definite."

Yami suddenly let out a dark laugh.

"Does it really matter?"

"It's more depressing to think about it that way, for one thing."

Yami stared at Kaiba for a moment. Did Kaiba have some kind of split personality thing that Yami didn't know about?

"…Since when did you care if I depressed myself or not?"

Kaiba glared off into the distance for a moment, exhaling the last lingering wisps of smoke from his cigarette slowly.

"Just because I don't like you doesn't mean I want your death," he said. "Sure, I threatened to at Dalton. But I've told you why I did that. You should be able to figure out the rest."

There he went again, giving only half the answers. Yami thought it was so strange, how he did that. Then again, Kaiba was about as normal as Bakura, really—just on the opposite end.

"You mean about your father and brother dying, and all?" Yami asked, taking a guess. Kaiba stiffened, at that.

"….yes, " He said, after a moment, "Something like that."

"I see."

Another silence. Then, Yami was struck with a thought that he probably wouldn't have the chance to voice again, after this; an ambiguity that no one else but Kaiba could explain.

"About Dalton…" Yami said.

"Yes?"

"I was just thinking…when you left," Yami said slowly, staring at the ground as he talked, "The last person you talked to was Bakura, right?"

"…yes," Kaiba replied. Yami noticed that his voice had suddenly taken on a strange tone to it. "it was."

"Well," Yami continued, "According to him…he told you that I'd miss you. That you were a friend, and that the fight we got into—I just told him it was a really bad fight we got into—didn't change the fact that I felt bad for it."

"…Yes, he told me something to that effect."

"You told him, 'let him', and then walked out," Yami continued, looking up.

"…What did you mean by that?"

For a long time, Kaiba was silent. He stood completely still, not even blinking as the slight morning breeze blew a lock of hair into his eyes.

Finally, when minutes had passed by with no sign of Kaiba responding, Yami took it upon himself to ask,

"Is that supposed to mean you won't tell me?"

But Kaiba then turned, and the stare he gave Yami then was unlike anything else Yami had ever seen before; intense yet ambiguous, telling of the volumes of emotions storming inside Kaiba—yet completely useless in revealing what, exactly, they were.

"That," he said, "Is something that you may never know."

RIIIIING!

Yami nearly jumped out of his skin, the noise was so loud. Kaiba's eyes flicked to the ground.

"You dropped your book," he said, after a moment.

Yami looked down, and saw his World History book splayed out on the pavement.

"Oh—"

Hurriedly he picked it up, making sure the notes that had been stuffed in it were all intact and whole. When he had straightened again, Kaiba was already gone, trailing along the edge of a crowd of students taking a shortcut around the side of the building. His pace was quick, and businesslike.

And it was thus that Yami was left with the distinct feeling that he had unknowingly ventured deeper into Kaiba's hidden self than he had ever intended on exploring.

* * *

He didn't tell the truth.

There was no way in hell he was being serious about helping Yami with this. It was just too strange.

Too un-Kaiba like.

He probably had something up his sleeve. What made Yami think that Kaiba was really going to go home and look the information up, and then make the effort to get back to Yami on it?

The whole cycle was near impossible.

He was probably going to make Yami do something to get the information, giving him just enough of it to convince Yami that he wanted it.

Asshole.

It still didn't explain his abruptness, though, or the fact that he seemed helpful, suddenly. If it hadn't been for the insults, Yami would have thought he was talking to someone else.

Anzu said he might be trying to make up for what he did, before. It made sense…

But so did what Dad had said that day, when he came home with the news that Kaiba's threat was all a lie, at Dalton;

"_But why would he be serious?" Mom asked, " He would only be serious if he were trying to change his ways…"_

"_Didn't his father say something about that?" Grandma asked._

"_Yes. He wasn't serious about it, though…"_

"_But how do we know that?" _

"_Because he just went against his word, anyway. He'd say one thing one minute, then do just the opposite. He was a hypocrite."_

Yami frowned at the unfinished homework laid out on his desk, not really seeing it. Changing his ways…? Did his father try to change, somehow? And if so, what changes was he trying to make?

"_My…my father was very smart. He figured out a few things. The pieces were there all along, but… no one ever cared to look at them, before him. I think they were all afraid to."_

What 'things' had Kaiba's father figured out? And what about the curse did they have to do with?

"_You're not the only one that wants this solved."_

"_Solved?" _

"_I thought you were trying to figure out a way to break it."_

Did he really think that's what Yami was trying to do? And if so, why was he thinking about breaking it?

Was there something he wanted to end? He'd never thought that the Kaiba family would have anything to worry about. Maybe they did.

…Whatever it was, though, it couldn't be nearly as bad as what his family had had to go through. He was the one who was cursed, after all.

Maybe Yami had implied that he was trying to solve it by asking that question in the first place.

But why help?

This was Kaiba he was thinking about…

"_I know I never say this, but after what you told me…I have a feeling there are a lot darker things behind all this than you're giving Kaiba credit for. And you're my best friend. Just…be careful, all right? Don't pull something stupid on me."_

He'd believed Bakura, when he'd said that. Bakura was good at reading into situations, and into people. Even if he didn't have all the information, his instincts still led him in the right direction.

Yami stood, and went downstairs to get some water. Between what Anzu, Bakura, Dad, Grandma, and Kaiba himself had told Yami, he didn't know what to think anymore.

* * *

A/N: I'll try to get the next chapter up before the end of spring break (next week, for me). But you know me; I'll say I'll get it done, and then inevitably it'll take me another month.

_(sigh)_

Such is the way of the world.


	27. Dust

A/N: I know that a lot of you guys were frustrated at the fact that Kaiba didn't say anything that was helpful last chapter, making the entire thing somewhat pointless in furthering the plotline of the story.

And so to you, I give you a chapter entirely devoted to Kaiba and his life.

How much you will actually find out, I cannot say. Because I'm writing this author's note before the chapter.

Wahahaha.

Chapter title: Dust

* * *

The world that evening was gray and black, made of cracked pavement and thick, impenetrable shadows. It was cold. Steely, icy silence sharpened the desolation on the large street. Snow was imminent, a threat hanging low in the clouds.

Harsh, sharp clicks cut through the night; the sound of an expensive shoe. It started at the corner, snapping smartly in the same steady rhythm as it progressed down the street. As the sound passed under a street lamp, a flash of pure white flickered against the blackness.

The footsteps traveled all the way to the dead end before they stopped. A clinking of chains against iron, a dull snap, the sound of old, rusty hinges screamed as they were turned only slightly, scraping against the ears. Another screech, and they were shut again. The chains were moved again, and then left alone.

He put the small gate key back into his pocket, and took in the sinister shadow before him. Barely penetrable from the night, its presence still washed over the senses, heightening them to a wariness that made the hairs on one's neck prickle in apprehension. And even though he couldn't see it at the moment, he knew that debris from years of windstorms was compacted into crevices of the roof, that ivy grew plentifully up the sides of the mansion, and that most of the windows were cracked and filthy from years of neglect. The front yard in the daytime looked as though it had been poisoned; nothing healthy grew there, anymore. It was easy to see why everyone said the place was haunted.

He knew it wasn't though; Seto Kaiba had lived in this mansion his entire life. He would have seen something by now, if it really were inhabited by ghosts.

He turned around and pulled the padlock on the gates to make sure it was secure. It wasn't the best way to keep people from breaking in, he knew, but his uncle wouldn't be willing to pay for anything actually effective. Not while alive, anyway.

Slowly he tread through the lawn, careful not to trip on the loose stone slabs that made up the pathway to the house. He would have to fix those soon, if he wanted to keep his neck intact. He was the one who had loosened them in the first place, with intentions of removing them altogether, as they didn't really look all that great. But then school had started up again, and he hadn't gotten around to ever fixing them since.

For since his father's and brother's deaths, Kaiba had taken up the duty of keeping the house looking somewhat decent. The staff mostly kept to themselves, cleaning what Kaiba's uncle told them to, and leaving the rest to attract the dust. However, this consisted of just about every part of the house _except _for the three rooms Kaiba's uncle kept himself in, and which Kaiba himself kept away from. At first, Kaiba had tried to get the maid to tend to other areas that Gozaburo hadn't asked for. And she complied, until Gozaburo found out. One firm talk with her, and the maid ceased to acknowledge Kaiba's existence, leaving Kaiba pretty much alone. Alone, and with no recourse except for taking up the job himself.

And so he had. Mostly it was to keep himself occupied during the long hours when there was nothing else to do. In his boredom, he had set for himself a number of small projects to do around the place when he had time to, thus setting for himself the potential of working constantly between the mansion's upkeep and his schoolwork. It had turned out better, in the end, than getting someone else to do things; Kaiba had learned how to do a lot of useful things, over the time he'd been living like this. He could ignore his thoughts that way, sometimes, focusing on keeping the plants alive in the back instead of what he'd only depress himself thinking about.

Although there were times when he really just needed to dwell in the darker sides of his mind for a while, as much as he didn't want to. Otherwise they would simply seize him, and taking him through loops of emotion that would be better left unfelt. At the end of it all, he'd be left with a body that couldn't relax enough to sleep.

So, he started going out after dark and walking where he wanted. Which really was nowhere in particular; he never went into any stores, and he never visited people. There was no one to visit in the first place. He simply wandered through residential areas, keeping to the darker patches of the street, watching the world as it slept. Sometimes it wouldn't be long at all, before he started feeling tired. Other times, it would take hours before he felt like going back. There were even a couple of times when he had watched the sun rise, hidden where no one would think to find him.

Tonight, it had been one of the shorter walks. Although that was mostly because he needed to get back to talk to his uncle before he went to bed.

Once inside, Kaiba shut the door behind him, ignoring the ominous echo it sent through the high-ceilinged halls. They always did that. Usually it was about four echoes before it stopped, and always in the same rhythm. One time he had counted seven—but Mokuba had been blabbering about something, so he wasn't sure if that was really accurate or not.

Not that it really mattered. He'd like it if the place didn't echo at all, but that was something he couldn't really fix. Just like the temperature around here; with the draft that drifted through cracks in places unknown to Kaiba, it was usually colder inside than it was outside—even upstairs, where heat was assumed to rise. Here, there wasn't any to travel up there in the first place.

Putting his coat in the closet, Kaiba straightened the sweater he had been wearing underneath. He stepped into the receiving room, which opened out from the entrance hallway, and looked out of one of the darkened windows at his reflection. He had to make sure he looked presentable and well groomed, as his uncle would see him no other way. An immaculate reflection stared back at him.

He stepped out into the hallway again, and took a right.

Immediately, the atmosphere changed from aged to musty and thick. Red and mahogany colors closed in on him, illuminated only by the lighting from the entrance hallway. Stale air filled his lungs. If given the chance, Kaiba was sure that things could grow there, hanging in midair, it was so seldom disturbed.

On his left was what he wanted; a smallish door, behind which sat Kaiba's only remaining relative. The man who held in his name everything that the Kaiba family had once owned, before they had all died for various reasons. The man who, when his father had been alive, Kaiba had thought very sour and cranky. Now, Kaiba's opinion of him had grown to that of outright loathing, as his demeanor had only gotten worse over the years. Patiently he waited for his time to come, wishing for an end to his dismal life almost daily as he sat behind his desk, running what was left of his brother's small business from the depths of a crumbling, cracked shell of a memory, two steps away from being condemned.

The man who Kaiba knew as Uncle Gozaburo.

Gozaburo didn't like to be disturbed that much, and preferred that Kaiba make himself invisible as much as possible. Kaiba himself was perfectly fine with this, as being in the same room with the man was not what he considered fun. He'd much rather that Gozaburo not be there at all; Kaiba pretty much lived on his own anyway, and it wouldn't be that hard to take on what he yet didn't do in this place.

However, he could not legally emancipate himself yet, as he was only 17. To make matters worse, he had just turned 17 only last August. He had another year before he could go through with the paperwork, which he fully planned on doing.

In the meantime, though, Kaiba would have to put up with facing his uncle every once in a while. The last time he was here was to get some things signed by Gozaburo so that Kaiba could go back into public schooling. He'd left in the first place because of his boredom, and the fact that he didn't want to deal with anyone. But after a year and a half, he'd decided that there was something to be said for sitting in a classroom and listening to a teacher. Not to mention a little variation in what had become truly a more boring existence than the one he'd left. Sure, he got out, but the people he had been spending most of his time with were dull.

And so, he'd gone through all the loops himself, and was placed in the grade he would have been in if he had never left. It had been a relatively painless encounter, as Kaiba only had needed to explain what Gozaburo was signing, and what school he was going to. Gozaburo hadn't said anything the entire time.

This, however... this wasn't going to be nearly as easy. But he needed to do it. He needed to know that he was on the right track.

After all, he had nothing to prove to Yami, or anything that he owed to him.

But at the same time, he did.

Strange, how things worked out like that.

Kaiba brought his hand up to the door, and knocked quietly.

"Come in," his uncle croaked.

The room was the same as it always had been; drab, lifeless, molding. Gozaburo sat behind his desk, pallid, old, and wrinkled, his ever-present frown deepening as Kaiba shut the door behind him. The commanding leadership inherent in the Kaiba family had long since slipped from Gozaburo's presence, leaving behind a beaten, defeated man hunched under a life that was already dead to the world.

And unless he could think of a way out of it, Kaiba was destined to this same fate. What sat before him was what he was going to become.

Perhaps that's why he had always despised Gozaburo so much.

"Yes?" his uncle growled.

Kaiba went straight to the point; the fewer the words spoken, the less irritated Gozaburo got.

"I'm going to go into my father's office," he announced, "But I don't have the key."

For a moment, Gozaburo simply glowered at Kaiba. Then, he slowly set down the pen he had been holding. Kaiba didn't move.

"Why," he finally snapped, his tone dangerously quiet, "would _I _know where it was? The last person in that room was your father."

Kaiba nodded.

"But I didn't see it after that."

"Well, then why don't you go ask him, if you're so curious!" Gozaburo hissed.

Kaiba didn't say anything. After a moment, Gozaburo asked,

"Why do you even want to go in there? Do you miss him, or something?"

The words would have been sarcastic, had Gozaburo not been so vehement in his tone.

"You know what's in there," Kaiba replied calmly.

Gozaburo's eyes widened at this, and he stood abruptly, leaning over his desk and pointing an accusing finger at Kaiba while he hissed,

"You think because you're a Kaiba that you can change everything! That the world will bow down before you like royalty! I can see it in the way you're holding yourself, you snot! Like a goddamned King you prance in here, announcing you're going to take your _highness_ into a room that hasn't been touched for three years! Well, let me give you some news; there's _nothing you can do about it_, and _there's nothing stopping it from happening_! It's worthless to try and change what you are! You're going to be worthless! You already are worthless! Just like your father you're worthless, thinking you can change everything! You'd think you would have gotten it when he died, but NO!" Gozaburo shouted, causing Kaiba to jump slightly.

"Do you know why your father died in a car accident? DO YOU!"

Kaiba said nothing.

"He was CARELESS, that's why! And now look! He's left me behind with _a snotty, selfish_, _brat that I'm forced to call a nephew_!"

His whole body shook with anger, as he spoke. The silence that followed was only broken by Gozaburo's erratic breathing. When he was finally done glaring at Kaiba he sat back down, relaxing once again into his defeated state.

"I see," Kaiba said quietly, finally taking his eyes away from his uncle, "Thank you."

Then he turned and left, shutting the door quietly behind him.

Out in the hallway, a grim smile crept across his face.

He had been right. That had been the worst temper Kaiba had ever seen Gozaburo in; he had insulted his own brother as well as Kaiba, and just about choked on his own spit while doing so. He looked about twenty years older than he really was, and sick on top of it.

Something was changing. Whether it was just the progression of time or something else, Kaiba didn't know.

But that wasn't for him to decide, anyway. He just had to lead the one who did have that power onto the right track—although that was challenge enough.

He turned left, and ventured further down the hallway.

He had been caught off guard, by Yami's question. He hadn't thought that Yami would ever think to ask him about anything relating to the curse. But he had, and he hadn't seemed dishonest.

And so that led him to here. At the very end of that same hallway on the left, where there was another door. Kaiba's pace slowed as came closer to it, a sense of hesitance suddenly clenching him.

He remembered the last time he was here. He'd been trying to convince his father that home schooling would be a better option for him. But his father had, again, resisted his arguments. He'd been leaving to drop Mokuba off at his friend's house, and had told Kaiba he'd hear it when he got back. He'd locked the door to this very room, pocketed his key, and looked Kaiba in the eye as he said,

"Don't get into trouble. I'll be back soon enough."

That was the last time Kaiba saw him alive.

Since then, he'd avoided this hallway at all costs. He'd never ventured down this far until now, only coming here if he had something to say to Gozaburo, or to slip a report card under his door. At first it had been out of a desperate attempt to keep himself together, and he had avoided just about everywhere where father and Mokuba had spent a lot of time. But that had only lasted for a couple of months, before he had gotten used to the fact that they were gone and that he had to move on with whatever was left of his life.

He'd never gotten as far as his father's office, though. He didn't really understand why he thought it so significant, the fact that he was now disturbing the place he'd last seen his father alive, but a part of him just didn't like doing this.

It wasn't like there was no cause for it, though; his reasons were very clear, and father wouldn't have looked down on him for it. In fact, he would have been urging him on.

Urging Kaiba to finish what he'd started.

Carefully, he reached out and rested his hand on the doorknob. Finding the key really was a problem, although he knew that Gozaburo wouldn't have given it to him, even if he did have it. It was very possible that Kaiba himself had shoved it somewhere, on one of his cleaning ventures, which he did a lot. Not that that helped him now.

Kaiba's hand clenched around the doorknob. It creaked.

Immediately, Kaiba's hand flew off. Then, he frowned. Doorknobs didn't creak…

Gingerly, he put his hand on the door and pushed.

It opened.

Only then did it occur to him that father would sometimes actually unlock the door to his office, instead of locking it. He never checked to make sure he had done one rather than the other.

Kaiba pushed the door the rest of the way open, and stepped into the room.

Dust was everywhere. Cobwebs were starting to form in the corners of the ceiling, and the air was even mustier than it was in uncle Gozaburo's room. Kaiba had to refrain from sneezing.

Strangely enough, the light still worked in here. Kaiba flipped it on, squinting for a moment as his eyes adjusted to working in proper lighting again, instead of the darkness of that hallway.

It looked pretty much the same as when he'd last seen it. Granted, the papers on the desk weren't new anymore, and parts of the mess on his desk had fallen to the floor. The window in the corner looked like the others in the house—caked with enough dirt to block any decent light out. But other than that…it was as though father were still here. Kaiba wouldn't have been all that surprised if he came walking through this very doorway—

He shivered. Thoughts like that were one of the reasons why he had been absolutely sure that he couldn't find what he wanted to anywhere else before he came here. He'd looked all over the rest of the house trying to find what he knew his father had written down, somewhere. He'd even gone through his father's personal belongings, thinking that he may have hidden them. The only place left would be here.

Kaiba reached out, and started to shift things. The most obvious place to start would be the desk…that's where one kept their most used belongings, after all. Haphazard stacks of papers Kaiba couldn't decipher at a glance, trinkets both he and Mokuba had given him…he didn't think about the stories behind them. If he did, he'd have to take another walk.

After a couple minutes of juggling the merged piles of paper so that they wouldn't fall all over the floor, Kaiba's hand landed on a paper of a different kind. Thicker than Xerox paper. Fancier. He pulled it out from where it was buried.

This was it.

Tentatively, Kaiba thumbed through the letters his father had days before he died, describing his thought about the curse, and its implications. Kaiba guessed that he wrote it on fancy paper for the appearance. Expensive stationary for expensive thoughts.

Kaiba shook his head. That had a really morbid second meaning to it.

He focused on what was in his hand, again. There was something he remembered his father talking about…he hadn't been able to put it into words in front of Yami today, but he knew that he would recognize it if he saw it...

There it was.

"_Therefore, this leaves only the possibility of a third party, or in the terms mentioned previously, a key, that is completely separate and indeterminable from the two conflicting families making a significant difference—"_

That was all he needed to know.

Carefully, Kaiba laid down the aged papers on the desk again, making sure they were as he had found them. He tread as softly as he could around the side of the desk and towards the door, figuring that his uncle was asleep by now. It was too quiet for him to be doing anything else. He exited the room without a sound.

But not before taking a long golden object out of its case, shimmering in the muted light as though it were brand new.

He might need this.

* * *

A/N: I know, kinda short compared to the others, but Kaiba's not really all that elaborate to narrate about. Personally, though, I thought this was going to be longer. But hey, it's still something.

And I know that since this is an AU fic, I could have made Gozaburo Seto's fondly remembered dad, but after all the fics I've read…that'd be a little _too _weird. So he's still a bad guy. Guess I'm a conformist.

Anyway, I can now safely say that you as readers know more about Kaiba's thoughts than Yami, Gozaburo, or anyone else within the story.

Exciting, neh?

Next up: Yugi! In all his angsty-ness!


	28. The Key

A/N: All right, guys. This is going to be a bit different than what I was planning on.

Because when Trempush took out her zip drive too soon after saving a finished chapter 28, she ended up losing the whole thing.

So, instead of re-writing what I already had before (as that would be way too boring, haha), I'm going to combine what was going to be chapter 29 originally and the contents of chapter 28—what I remember of them. Which, really, are the bits important to the plotline.

So here we go. Chapter 28—version 2.0 Complete with Yami and Kaiba AND Yugi and the ghost. So many characters! All in one chapter! Can Tremp handle it!

_(Head explodes)_

Chapter title: The Key

* * *

"Wha—?"

"I've got something to tell you."

Yami stared at Kaiba's retreating figure, as he walked down the hallway. The only thing that broke Yami's confused gaze from him was when his notebook decided to unload all its contents onto the floor of the hallway, leaving Yami scrambling under people's feet for them.

It had been so sudden; Yami had been just standing at his locker, getting what he needed out of it for the first half of the day. Two milliseconds later, he had a hand on his shoulder and Kaiba's voice in his ear.

And now he was walking away. No explanation as to where, or when. Maybe he meant for Yami to follow him now?  
Yami got his papers together as quickly as he could, stuffing them into his binder and looking down the hallway in the direction Kaiba had walked off in.

But Kaiba wasn't there.

Yami rolled his eyes. Knowing Kaiba, he probably expected Yami to figure out where he had gone. Which was completely ridiculous, considering Yami wasn't anywhere close to telepathic—

RIIIIIING.

Ah, crap, he was late for Homeroom. Quickly, Yami got his stuff together and started off down the hall, hoping Mrs. LeGrange wouldn't give him too scary of a look when he walked in the door. She already had a sour face, and the wrinkles didn't help at all—

"Well."

Yami jumped, and looked to his left.

There was Kaiba, leaning against the wall, arms crossed.

"I'm surprised you made it to the end of the hallway," he said. "That's pretty far for you to remember."

Yami frowned.

"Remember?" he asked, "What the hell are you talking—"

"I said I had something to tell you," Kaiba interrupted. "I thought that you would assume I was going to do the same thing I did yesterday."

Yami raised an eyebrow.

"What, drag me outside and insult me while making me smell like a smoker for the rest of the day?"

Kaiba's eyes narrowed.

"Do you want me to tell you about the curse or not?"

Yami stared at Kaiba for a moment. Did that mean Kaiba was actually _serious_, yesterday?

Most importantly, there was something that all of this implied that Yami hadn't been expecting at all:

That there was something that Yami didn't know about the curse.

"…what's there to tell?" he asked warily.

Kaiba pushed himself off the wall, and started walking.

* * *

"Have you ever heard about a key?" Kaiba asked, as he put his lighter back into his pocket.

When Yami didn't answer, Kaiba turned to face him.

"The curse?" he clarified, misinterpreting Yami's expression for confusion. Yami blinked, and shot him a glare.

"I'm trying to think," he said. "I feel like I've heard something about it before, mentioned somewhere…it's just that I'm not remembering where."

"Did someone come close to finding it?"

Slowly, Yami shook his head, as he searched his mind and memory.

"No…" he said, "I think…it was a term they used, when they were trying to figure out the details of the curse…" After a moment, he shook his head.

"I don't remember."

Kaiba gave a curt nod, and exhaled more smoke into the light breeze that had picked up, since their arrival. Unfortunately, Yami was downwind, and he got a really strong dose of it.

"Do you _have_ to do that?"

"Depends," Kaiba replied, "Do you _have_ to know about the curse?"

Yami was silent.

Kaiba let out a small laugh.

"Three times in a semester doesn't make you cancerous, you know. You'd have to be around me a bit more often for that to happen."

Yami turned his head away, as the smoke began to permeate the area.

"It still smells nasty."

"You're not the one inhaling it firsthand."

Yami raised an eyebrow, at that.

"…so you don't like how it smells, but you still smoke?"

Kaiba shrugged.

"Stranger things have happened."

…The statement was so odd, to Yami, that he didn't quite know how to respond to it. Then again, Kaiba's behavior in general was never all that predictable.

"Anyway," Kaiba said, after a moment, "that person that used the word 'key' as a term was on the right track."

"…What do you mean?" Yami asked, trying to ignore the dry prickling feeling that was starting to form in his throat.

"If you look at the curse in its entirety," Kaiba said, "and everything that's been recorded about it since it was made, there are themes that run through the texts. There's the necklace burning when the curse's rules are violated, of course. But there's also other things."

"…Like what?" Yami asked.

"Like how there always seems to be something else besides our families that contributes to what happens."

"…_What_?"

"Think about it," Kaiba replied. "Every time something strange has happened that was out of the ordinary range of things that the curse causes to happen, there was a witness that seemingly didn't have anything to do with either family. A single witness, at that. No one else was around to see it but them."

"What are you talking—"

"Read the texts again," Kaiba interrupted. "You'll see what I mean."

Yami stared at the ground before him. He would think that Kaiba was trying to simply confuse him, but…Yami had a feeling that Kaiba was being serious, this time. After all, it was only yesterday when Kaiba had told Yami that he wasn't the only one that wanted to see this solved.

"There's a witness," Kaiba continued, "from outside the family that sees the curse at its worst. And since this is the only case where the demon will act up the most, the argument can be made that this witness _causes_ it to happen."

Yami started feeling the twinges of confusion start to work their way through his brain.

"But…that doesn't make sense…"

Kaiba turned to him.

"How so?"

Yami put his hand to his forehead. This was completely new to him; he'd never heard anything like this mentioned before, except in extremely vague passing…

"They'd have to have been connected to when it started for that to be true," he thought aloud. "But there's only the priest and the pharaoh involved…was someone else there that they didn't notice?"

Kaiba shrugged.

"I wouldn't know," he said. "I just know that there's always a third, unassociated party that sees things they shouldn't. And that this person has been referred to before as a key. Quite a number of times, actually."

A witness to extremely strange things that happened…

Immediately, Yami thought of Anzu, who had seen the necklace's reaction to someone trying to take it off. But that was a normal thing, as far as the curse went…it still wasn't good that she had seen that, but it wasn't out of the ordinary…

"Why a _key_?" Yami asked. "…What makes them like a key?"

RIIIIIIIING!

"Gah!" Yami shouted, startled by the noise. Kaiba threw what was left of his cigarette on the pavement.

"I don't know the answer to that," he said. Then, after a moment, he started to make his way back into the building.

But there was still on thing—one question—that Yami's mind couldn't get past.

"Wait!" he yelled, once he had gotten over the shock of being startled by the bell. Kaiba paused, and turned back.

"How did you know about the history of the curse? I thought…I thought I had the only copy of the stories of what the necklace has done."

For a moment, Yami saw a glint of that same intense, indescernible emotion that he had seen only the day before.

Kaiba laughed hollowly.

"Like I said; my father was a very smart man."

And he turned around and walked through the door they had come out of.

* * *

Nothing felt right. Nothing had been feeling right for a very long time—espeically over the past few days. Nothing Yugi tried to concentrate on would lend itself to being thought over, nothing that he did held interest. All the time, Yugi could only think of one thing, and one feeling. They took over his every waking moment, and sometimes even those in which he was asleep.

The thing that plagued his thoughts was the one thing that shouldn't even exist, logically speaking; the ghost. Which, really, was responsible for everything out of the ordinary, scary, and outright frightening that had been happening to Yugi lately. And all of it—from the ghost's appearing to Yugi at strange times, to whatever had happened in front of the library, to what had happened inside the library—led Yugi to his current unshakable mental state:

Apprehension.

What had happened a couple days ago at the library was only the beginning. That sixth sense that had predicted so many other things in his life—so many useless, mundane things that didn't even have to do with him—seemed to be whirring out of control, at the thought of this nightmare that Yugi had been thrown into.

It also told him that this was just the beginning. Everything that had been going on was all leading up to a moment whose severity Yugi could only imagine. And, as with everyting else that he seemed to get involved in involuntarily, it really had nothing to do with him.

After all, Yugi was always the one to get picked on, beaten up, all the rest of it. He was the dog that everyone kicked. Other people's shit always led back to him somehow, even if he never did anything. If anyone was having a bad problem, Yugi would be feeling it somewhere within the next few days. He never liked it, but it had been the role he'd been playing for his entire life. Ever since Mom left, anyway.

And this time, it was no different. The only reason the ghost talked to Yugi was because it wanted to contact Yami. Somehow, through a twist of fate that Yugi could not figure out, the ghost had ended up being only visible to Yugi, and not Yami, as would be the logical thing to have happened. If it weren't for that, Yugi wouldn't even know about all this. And Yami was the one who seemed to hold within him much more than what met the eye. Yugi could only think of himself as an observer.

A witness.

And as for Yami…his façade Yugi was familiar with; a clueless, nosy idiot who didn't know when to stop getting into other people's business. But Yugi had realized at the library that it was just that; a shell. He had thought Yami to be a shallow, brainless fool before, that had no idea what he was talking about, half the time.

But what Yami had said at the library, right before Yugi left, proved this impression wrong:

"_Just because I act clueless doesn't mean I don't know anything! You don't think I know how that feels? I know damn well what it's like to be completely alone, with no way out! It's hell! You're not the only one in the world that's been depressed before, all right? So just—don't even talk, if that's the only shit that's going to come out of your mouth!"_

Nothing about the way Yami acted would have cued Yugi into thinking he harbored anything close to emotions like that. He wouldn't have thought that Yami would be capable of holding anything in that required any kind of effort to keep in; he seemed to be very open about things. Sure, he got angry every once in a while and punched people, but it wasn't the same as outright depression.

_Completely alone with no way out…_

What was he trapped by?

What could have possibly isolated Yami from the rest of the world?

It was here that the ghost's words came to mind:

"_Because there is an evil in Yami, Yugi; this is what kept me from making Yami see me."_

Logically, it made no sense. But after what had happened at the crosswalk only days before…Yugi didn't know what to think.

It would seem that the phrase 'seeing is believing' would make the experience valid. And it had been the philosophy that Yugi had lived by, in the past. But now, he was confronted with something that was like an outlandish number in statistics; it threw off the average, and made it a pain to calculate out anything of value.

But logically, it fit. He had seen it. He had experienced it. He rememberd it as clearly as though it was happening right then.

But at the same time, it was logically impossible. Evils did not live inside people. They either were evil themselves, or they had traits in their personalities that made them evil.

The only evil that Yugi could rationally see as existing inside Yami would be one that thought separately of Yami. Posessed him, even. This was why, Yugi figured, the ghost was trying to contact Yami, instead of the evil that it spoke of. And judging by what Yugi saw of Yami's reaction, when the ghost tried to get Yami to see it, it was the evil that rejected the ghost. Yami was in the middle, choking from a fear that Yugi never thought he would see manifested within a human body.

Yami's reaciton, Yugi had concluded upon reflection, embodied the kind of blind fear that one has nightmares about; that freezes your every fiber of being beyond the ability to even breathe—let alone scream.

The only part of this that Yugi couldn't understand was that, if Yami had that kind of evil living within him…how could he have hidden it so well from the world? The guy couldn't even lie that well, much less hide a part of himself.

Maybe he didn't know about it. Maybe it was only the ghost that knew about this evil.

But Yugi could.

This was why he was certain the ghost would come back, at some time or another. It needed Yugi's help, if it wanted to try to tell Yami about this…thing that was inside him. And it wasn't that hard to figure out what it wanted Yugi to do for him…

Yugi let out a dry laugh. That'd be a pleasant conversation;

"Hello Yami, I've been informed that you have an evil lurking in your being somewhere, and there's this ghost I've been hallucinating about that knows about it."

…right.

There was no way that ghost was going to get him to talk to Yami. He'd already given Yami more information than he deserved to have at the library; now he knew about the ghost, and that Yugi had been seeing it since the beginning of the semester.

It had been enough to send Yugi practically running out of there.

He wasn't about to try it again. He didn't want to, and no one was going to make him. Not even a ghost.

Speaking of which…it was getting slightly chilly. Well—considerably colder than it had been the past few hours. After all, it as winter, and Yugi was sitting in front of a window…

Yugi looked up from the homework he had been trying to focus on. The only light in his bedroom was that of his desk lamp, as he hadn't gotten up since the sun had set to turn on the overhead light. His math lay before him, half finished; he hadn't had time to do it in class. And he certainly didn't need a ghost to distract him from getting it done at home.

Yugi looked around the room, just to make sure…and groaned inwardly, at the sight that met his eyes.

Over in a darkened corner of the room, a silvery figure stood, arms crossed, looking around at the different objects surrounding it within Yugi's room. When it noticed that Yugi had turned its way, the ghost gave Yugi a small half smile.

"I come without fear or chaos," it said, "this is different."

…If the statement was meant to be funny, it was lost on Yugi.

After a few awkward moments, the ghost's expression fell.

"I am sorry," it said, "It is not time to laugh."

Yugi went back to his homework. If the ghost had something to say, it would tell Yugi regardless of whether he wanted to hear it or not…

Nothing.

After a long moment, Yugi looked up to see that the ghost was simply looking at him, a thoughtful expression on its face.

"…What?" Yugi finally asked.

"You are knowing why I am here, yes?"

Yugi said nothing.

"Yes," the ghost said knowingly, "You are knowing what I want to ask, and you are going to tell me no. To go away, and find someone else to do what I want."

So the ghost didn't think he was stupid. Kudos to it.

Slowly, Yugi nodded.

"I've already got enough problems in my life right now," he said, "I don't need any more."

The ghost sighed, and crossed the room; Yugi could feel the chill get nearer.

"I do not try to make you mad, or to make your life hard," the ghost said. "I do not try to do anything harmful to you or anyone else. I mean to explain, with these words that I am saying. Both to you and to Yami."

Yugi looked at the ghost, resisting the urge to laugh derisively in its face.

"Really?" he asked instead, "Because the only thing you've done so far is confuse me. You're not even supposed to be here," he added, "You're not real."

The ghost, at this, let out a small laugh.

"You must define 'real' for this to work, Yugi."

Yugi blinked.

…good point. He was kind of fuzzy on the definition as it was, and even more so now. But that was probably because he had always had way too much time to think about things.

"…But this is besides the point. You are knowing what I am trying to ask. You ask questions that are smart. I want to answer them, but…I cannot."

"…Why?" Yugi asked.

The ghost looked away.

"It is…hard to explain."

Yugi rolled his eyes.

"Everything is, according to you."

"But I do not mean to make it this way," the ghost replied. "I only say it is hard to explain, because I do not want what happens last time we meet to happen again."

…So the evil controlled the ghost, somehow? It knew what the ghost was doing?

Interesting…

"However, if you agree to what I ask you…then I am sure you will find out everything. If not from me, then from Yami."

"…but what if I don't _want_ to find out anything? What if I just want you to leave me alone and let me move on with things?"

"Do you think that forgetting what has happened will make it go away?" The ghost asked gently.

Yugi didn't respond.

"I have lived for many years, Yugi," the ghost continued, "I have seen many many times people trying to forget things by trying not to think about them anymore. But if the problem is not solved…you will only wonder. You will never forget, even if you live hundreds of years."

Yugi put his pencil down; as long as the ghost was here, he had no chance of doing anything related to math.

"Wondering is better than what happened in front of the library."

He turned to the ghost, standing behind him.

"You can't tell me I'm wrong."

The ghost sighed heavily, and sat down on the edge of Yugi's bed, just outside the lamplight. Its shoulder facing the lamp became considerably more faded than the rest of it.

"No," it said, "I cannot."

"…So why am I even a part of this?" Yugi asked.

The ghost thought for a moment, staring into a point deep within its thoughts.

"There is no reason you are a part," it said slowly, "It is simply…that you are."

Yugi frowned. This wasn't making sense.

"So I'm just a random person that was chosen?"

The moment the question was out of his mouth, Yugi gave out a short laugh.

"Sounds like a bad movie…"

"I do not write it, if it is," the ghost said. "I only act."

Yugi turned to the ghost.

"Who did, then?"

"Who write it?"

"Yeah."  
The ghost's expression turned solemn.

"He lived…long time ago. I do not know how he made what I am now living with so, but he make it this way. Now, I must find way to break free of it. This is the only way that I finally die."

"…Why do you want to die so badly?" Yugi asked, on a whim. He knew the answer partially, but he wanted to see if he was right.

"Let me say it like this," the ghost said, "Do you want to live past the time when everyone you know in life is dead, and no one sees you anymore? What good does it do to watch people you are never knowing as friends and family live and die and pass out of knowledge again and again, when you cannot talk to them? It is like being trapped in glass box; you can only watch. I have lived like this for many years, Yugi. I am ready to end how I live now. I am tired. I want to rest."

It was this that triggered another memory in Yugi's mind, from the last time they had met:

"_I will give you one word, and you will have to believe me."_

"_Freedom."_

"So you're trapped," Yugi thought aloud, trying to piece together what he could, "by the evil—the evil that lives in Yami. And you've been fighting it for a long time—since you were supposed to die. But you're still here. Which means…that it's the evil that's keeping you here. The person that made it like this is already gone, so you don't know how to break free…but…since I can see you…you're going to try again. And this time you want to tell Yami, through me, about what's inside him?"

Yugi looked up. The ghost was giving him a warm smile, proud, almost.

"I do not have to say anything, and you understand," it said. "There is nothing that you say that is not true. I do not know why you see me, but it is so."

But Yugi was still frowning.

"…How did you know it was me that could see you?" he asked. "Did you sense it, or something?"

"The reason why I am knowing you are the one I see," the ghost said, "is not through Yami, or even through me. It is through you."

Yugi blinked.

"…What's that supposed to mean?"

"I am meaning," the ghost continued, "that, even though you are not chosen by anyone, fate tells me where you are. It is because you _talk_ to Yami, that first time at the library. Do you remember first time, when you first work on project together?"

"Yeah…"

"Do you remember what you are saying to him, when you are about to leave?"

Yugi was silent.

"Yami asks you if you are a trusting person. You say that you are not."

Still, Yugi was silent. He was slowly starting to remember the conversation, and he knew what was coming next. But even if he hadn't remembered, the ghost seemed to know about the incident very well;

"But then you say something that you are not understanding, at the time. You do not know why you say it, but you say it anyway. You remember what you tell him?"

Yugi remembered perfectly well what he had said toYami. It was the one part of that conversation that he had kicked himself over, later;

"_I guess… I'll make an exception."_

An exception in his mistrust. An exception given to Yami, whom he really didn't know, at the time. And whom he didn't know much better now.

"It is because you tell him this, that I am knowing that you are the one who sees me," the ghost said, "I cannot explain it any more than that."

"…So because I told someone I normally wouldn't open up to about my family, you assumed that I would be able to see you?"

"Ehm…" the ghost said, squinting thoughtfully, "yes, I guess this is what I am saying."

"…that makes no sense," Yugi stated. "People do that all the time, and nothing like this happens to them."

"But not everyone has what Yami has," the ghost countered, "Remember that I say before that Yami has to do with everything. I am not stretching truth, when I say this."

"…But he's only the one that the evil is _in_," Yugi said, "he's just a host, right?"

"He is closest," the ghost replied, "I tell him what I can. After this, it is up to Yami to know what to do. He will find a way to stop it. He will have all the pieces; he will need to figure out how to put them together."

At this, Yugi gave the ghost a funny look.

"…You're really that confident in him?"

The ghost smiled that half smile again, and shook its head.

"It may not seem like he is able," it said, "but he is already battling against it. He does not know it—there is no way that he can know—but he is close to the end. He is closer than I am ever seeing before."

"…how?"

"Ah," the ghost said, shaking its head, "this is too far. I can not tell you that. Not yet.

"I have to get Yami first?" Yugi asked.

The ghost nodded.

"Yes," it said, "You know enough to understand, when I talk to Yami. This is enough."

"…What do you want to tell him?"

The ghost raised its eyebrows at Yugi.

"Is this meaning that you are going to help me?"

Yugi looked away.

_Was_ he going to?

He looked to the ghost. It was watching him, fighting to hide how much it wanted Yugi to comply; Yugi could see it in how it held itself, perched on the edge of the bed.

It was startling, to Yugi, how freely the ghost talked of dying. It seemed calm, unruffled, as it talked of an evil that it had been trapped by for lifetimes—something that Yugi would think would drive one to a point beyond comprehension, if not outright insanity. It was so close to the end of hundreds of years' worth of torture through isolation and pain that it could taste it, moving through what it had to as though it had done so a million times before, comfortable with a tension that Yugi felt tearing at his insides, even though it was not his own.

It made what Yugi was going through seem a mere pittance; a speck of dirt on one's shirt that could be easily removed.

"_Wait…Since when did I have a reason for helping you?"_

"_Since you believed that there was something in your life that you wanted to change. Something that you could become, that would ease the darkness you now live in."_

…Perhaps so.

"…All right," he said. "I'll help."

* * *

A/N: That was probably a lot better than drawing out Yugi and the ghost's talking over the same number of pages that this is (10, in Word). I know that there are a lot of chapters in here that really could be condensed into a couple of paragraphs. Heck, chapter six is completely useless; everything Yugi thinks is implied in later chapters anyway. And if it's not, it could be tacked on somewhere as a thought Yugi has somewhere along the line.

But hey; you write, you learn.

Goal: Finish Doors Through Walls by the time school starts up again.

We shall see if this works, or not.


	29. Contact

A/N: Nicknamed the "ZOMG!" chapter by my sister.

I'll leave it to you to figure out why.

Haha.

Chapter title: Contact

* * *

Yugi.

It had to be Yugi.

Yami walked into Mr. Dither's classroom and sat down, wondering why he hadn't thought of it before when he had been standing outside with Kaiba. He felt stupid now, for thinking of Anzu as a possible whatsit first. A key, Kaiba called it.

After all, Yugi was the only one that had been witness to something whose causes even Yami couldn't figure out, and he'd been living with the curse for seven years. The only things Yami knew for sure was that there was a ghost that had been involved, and that Yugi knew about it—Yugi, who wasn't even looking Yami's way now.

And Yami would have just gone up to him and demanded to talk to him about it, but…he wasn't sure that it would help solve anything.

All right, so he had found out that someone sees bad things that happen to the person bearing the necklace, and that there is always a person like that. That alone didn't really imply much…if anything, it just made the whole curse more confusing.

Because if there was a continuous witness, that meant that there had to be a connection between them and the curse. This he could understand; Yami remembered how weird it was, noticing that no one had heard him screaming, or that no one had seen them as Yami had laid there, unconscious, while Yugi simply stared at him. And when he came to, he was about ready to pass out, at points. Someone would surely had at least asked him what was wrong. They were downtown; it was always full of people during the day.

But no one had come, during the entire time they were out there. Only at the end, when they were both standing and conversing somewhat normally again, Yami notice people walking by.

So now the question was whether the witness—the key—drove the people away, somehow? Did Yugi subconsciously clear the place? It was unlikely.  
The more plausible situation was that the demon had done it itself. Which left this key with no powers again, and just a random connection to the curse.

Were they supposed to do something, after they'd seen things happen? Were they supposed to try to help, somehow? After all, they were called a key…there must have been something they were a key to…but what?

Did they unlock something? The curse?

How?

"Hey, Joey."

Jim's voice came to Yami through his mess of thoughts, and he idly gave an ear towards the conversation, as he stared out the window—a habit he had taken to a lot while in World History, lately.

"Wha?" Joey responded.

"You going to the basketball game tomorrow?"

"Yeah. Who're you guys against?"

"Dalton."

Yami blinked.

"Tomorrow?" he asked aloud. Jim turned to Yami, and nodded.

"Yeah. That's your old school, right?"

"Yeah. I didn't know it was tomorrow, though…today's Thursday?"

"Today's Thursday," Jim said.

Yami blinked a couple more times.

"…Oh…"

Jim laughed a little.

"Tired?"

"Yeah…" Yami replied, "I just haven't been keeping track of the days, I guess…"

"Guess not," Jim agreed. "but yeah, tomorrow's the game. Your old team any good?"

Yami shrugged.

"I never was on it," he said, "I just played with them during lunch outside. And after school, sometimes."

"But you still played with them," Jim insisted, "Anything unique about them we should know?"

Again, Yami shrugged.

"Other than a bunch of boy drama, no."

"Boy drama?" Jim laughed, "What's _that _supposed to mean?"

It was only then that Yami realized he had used a phrase he'd picked up from Bakura. And for a very good reason, too:

"I have a friend who dated some guys on the team," Yami explained, "and since I hung out with him all the time, I got to hear about how they all treated him."

"…Oh," Jim said, giving Yami a strange look, "That's, um…interesting…."

"I know. None of them are good boyfriends, from what I've heard."

Yami could tell Jim was trying to decide whether to laugh at the comment or take Yami seriously. It was amusing to watch him struggle.

"Just in case you ever needed to know," Yami added, keeping his face straight.

Inwardly, though, he was thinking of how exactly he was going to tell this to Bakura; he'd get a kick out of it. Probably say something along the lines of how fun it was to mess with the minds of the normal.

He'd have to call him anyway, before the game; Bakura was insistent on getting a description of Joey out of Yami, and if he was actually going to be at the game on Friday or not. Yami had no idea what Bakura was up to, but judging by his comments during their last conversation about being extremely bored at the moment, Yami was sure it would be quite interesting.

He almost felt sorry for Joey.

…almost.

* * *

"Eh, Yugi? You have plan for this, yes?"

Yugi rolled his eyes, and scribbled a note on the margin of his notebook;

_I told you in homeroom: after school. _

"After school you will talk to him?"

_Yes._

"oh, okay."

Yugi tried to focus on Mr. Dither, as he scribbled something akin to a review for tomorrow's chapter test on the board review today. In ordinary circumstances, he would have been either reading for falling asleep due to boredom. But neither one of those options seemed plausible, now that Yugi's right shoulder was slowly freezing to death…

Yugi would have told the ghost that he would schedule another study session for that damned final project with Yami, and that the ghost could come and talk to Yami then. But the ghost had insisted on getting it done today, if possible. It seemed to think that something was going to happen soon.

Although when Yugi asked him what, the ghost couldn't quite say.

"All I'm having is feeling that he will need to know right away," it had said.

Yugi hadn't argued with that. If anyone should know about trusting a gut feeling, it would be him. He'd never had one lie to him before.

Although he didn't appreciate writing notes in the middle of class to an entity that supposedly wasn't there. It was hard enough trying to stand the cold that he hoped only he could feel, and not looking at the silver figure next to him so as to appear at least somewhat sane. It was floating on Yugi's right side, right in between his and Jim's seats; if Yugi looked too much at the ghost, Jim would think him very strange—especially since he seemed to be talking to Yami about guys dating guys on basketball teams, or something like that…Yugi didn't catch the whole conversation.

Mostly because his peripheral vision was blocked on the right by a _silvery, translucent mass of ghost…_

Yugi sighed; there had to be another way to do this. He could tell this was going to get really distracting really fast. After all, it was only about half an hour into first period…if he had to have this thing breathing down his neck for the rest of the day, he'd go nuts.

_Isn't there any way you could disappear but still be here?_ Yugi wrote.

"That is what I am always doing, Yugi," the ghost's voice said casually, in Yugi's right ear.

You're not doing it now, Yugi pointed out. 

"I am talking to you. You have to see me in order to hear me."

Didn't that just figure?

Yugi tried to hide his previous writing with his hand, as he wrote,

Why don't you go sit on the windowsill, or something? 

There was a pause, and Yugi felt the cold intensify. He had to resist the strong urge to look at what the ghost was doing, and instead studied the lizard tail sticking out of Mr. Dither's front shirt pocket very carefully…

"I am not understanding your writing," the ghost finally said, "It is too, ehm…oh, what is word…"

Sloppy? 

"Yes, that is it! Sloppy!"

Yugi paused for a moment, marveling at how strangely the ghost had pronounced the word 'sloppy'. He'd hardly recognized it at first…

"You want me to do something…I cannot read what.."

_YOU'RE FREEZING MY SHOULDER OFF,_ Yugi scratched out in capital letters, flipping to a clean page the instant he was done writing it.

"…eh?"

Yugi sighed angrily, and explained on the next margin;

_I can't concentrate. Go float in the corner, or something.._

"Oh, yes, I am understanding now. But I cannot do that."

Yugi felt his eyes widen in frustration.

Why not! 

"Ehm, how do I explain…right now, Yugi, you are only one I see clearly. Everything else around you is…dark."

Yugi frowned; that was weird…

_So you can't see anyone else around me right now?_

"Well…I see what _you_ see of them. But I do not see them clearly, because I do not stay with you for very long. I do not know what you know of them."

Yugi's pen paused over the paper, as he thought over that for a moment. How strange…

It made more sense, though, how the ghost could feel so isolated. All it saw were shadows…a half world…

So it wasn't really watching Yugi and Yami as they went about their daily lives…it was just watching them exist and react to blurry shapes.

Careful to ensure that the ghost was the only one that could see it, Yugi wrote out his train of thought:

_So when I was studying with Yami that first time, when you got that feeling I was the only other person that could see you…did that mean you saw me differently?_

"No; I had to talk to you for that to happen."

_Ah._

"I only use feeling at that point. I tell you this already."

Yugi nodded his head ever so slightly at that, for the ghost.

There was a silence, as Yugi glanced at what Mr. Dither had written most recently on the board. It seemed to be the end of the review—

RIIIIIIING!

"Am I hearing bell?"

Yugi quickly scribbled a 'yes' on his paper, before putting it away, and pulling his backpack over his shoulders. When he was making sure the straps weren't twisted, he noticed something very odd;

His right shoulder didn't feel cold to the touch at all.

It was just the same temperature as the other one.

* * *

Maybe something would happen if he asked him.

Yami contemplated the thought, as he tried to follow along to what Mrs. Robertson was doing to the math problems on the overhead. Although apparrently his mind was wandering to the other, more weighty problems in Yami's life right now.

He'd been thinking about it off and on in History last period, after Jim and Joey had started paying attention to what was going on up front again.

Because it had been just after he'd started talking to Yugi that the demon had acted up, Yami had realized. They hadn't even exchanged that many words.

And that meant that the same thing might happen again.

Maybe that's how the key part of this whole thing was triggered; maybe Yami had to have another burn across his neck to figure out what the key did.

…Not that he was willing to try that, again…

Still, either way involved talking to Yugi; whether it was to ask him about the specifics of that ghost (which Yami had a feeling had a lot to do with it), or to see if his connection to the curse was to send Yami to the severe burn unit of the hospital.

…Maybe it was time to approach Yugi about that final project business. After all, the due date was getting close, and they had to present what little they'd gotten together, so far…

Yami looked at the clock; ten minutes before class was over. Mrs. Robertson was wrapping up. She was probably going to finish early. If she did, Yugi wouldn't dissappear on Yami, like he always did.

But what if it _did_ act up again? Would people see this time?

If Kaiba was right about what he'd told Yami, that meant that the people around them would either not see Yami and Yugi anymore, just not notice them all the sudden, or dissappear completely, like Yami was sure had happened last time. Or they could just see Yami and Yugi reacting to whatever happened. Not that that'd be good …

On the contrary; that'd be really bad. Especially if they saw everything.

According to Kaiba, though, that wouldn't happen.

But how willing was he to trust Kaiba, all the sudden?

Not very.

…After school. He knew where Yugi's locker was. He'd just have to approach Yugi then, and hope that there weren't too many people in the hallway.

* * *

_After school!_ Yugi scribbled in his notebook,_ I told you!_

"How long is your school lasting! This is too long!"

That's why it's called a school day! Now shut up before someone else reads this! 

"Fine. I will stop." The ghost said, sounding very annoyed.

Although it was nothing compared to what Yugi felt, at the moment. After all, the ghost could act however the hell it wanted because Yugi was the only one that could see it. Yugi, on the other hand, was in the middle of class. He had to act as he always did; bored out of his mind, or interested in the book he would usually be reading.

As it was, he was scribbling frantically in his notebook, and acting really annoyed, at points. And no matter how much he told himself that his reactions were the only ones that people could see, he still felt like turning around and chewing the ghost out for what it was worth..

"I hear bell, Yugi. You say there are two more after this before it ends?"

Throwing caution to the wind, Yugi nodded, slamming his notebook shut.

"You are mad at me, Yugi?"

Yugi didn't answer that, instead busying himself with packing up his things. He sincerely hoped, for the ghost's sake, that it didn't ask again when school would let out. Then he really _would_ lose it…

* * *

Crap.

He didn't remember where Yugi's locker was.

Yami swore under his breath as he stood in the middle of the hallway after school, racking his brains for the eight millionth time for what he thought he remembered about getting to Yugi's locker last time. It was in the beginning of the semester, when Yugi had found all those water balloons…and he remembered everything after that.

Just not how to get there.

Yami stamped his foot angrily, and swore again.

This was completely stupid! _Why _did he have absolutely no directional skills! Yugi was probably on his way home by now—

Yami blinked and frowned down the hallway.

Yugi was walking towards him, face eerily blank.

How odd…

When he'd gotten close enough to Yami, he simply handed a piece of paper folded in half to him.

Yami slowly took the note from Yugi and opened it.

_I've told you about the ghost,_ it said, _and it wants to talk to you now._

For a moment, Yami simply stared at the writing, which was clearly Yugi's. How was it that they both decided, on the same day, to talk about the ghost? He knew that Yugi had a knack for guessing about people, but…this was just creepy…

He looked up.

"Right now?" he asked.

A slow nod, and Yugi turned and stared walking.

And for the second time that day, Yami followed, this time more bewildered than before.

* * *

Yugi abruptly stopped walking when they were far enough behind the school that no one could eavesdrop on them. He would have liked it if no one could see them, either, but he didn't think it really mattered; all anyone was going to see was Yami and Yugi talking to each other.

He turned to Yami, who stumbled to a stop; apparently he had tripped over a bit of the crumbling pavement beneath them.

Idiot.

While Yami regained his balance, Yugi took in a deep breath. This was going to be more than just a little strange…

"Just repeat what I am saying," the ghost said, "This is all I am wanting."

Yugi sighed; here goes nothing…

"It's…here."

Yami looked to Yugi.

"The ghost, you mean?"

"Yeah," Yugi said, nodding to where it was floating, "Right there."

Yami turned to the spot, wide-eyed. For a moment he didn't say anything, or even move. The ghost turned to him, piercing Yami with a stare that, if Yami had seen him, would have most likely scared him.

As it was, his eyes raked over the general area where Yugi had nodded, and he finally said,

"…Seriously?"

Yugi rolled his eyes.

"No, I'm pulling this all out of my ass just to confuse you," he said flatly. "I love acting like a schizoid in the middle of school, believe me."

Yami's eyes narrowed into a glare.

"Funny."

"Eh, do not fight! You are here now, do not get angry and walk away!"

Yugi turned to see the ghost waving its hands at Yugi, and shaking its head.

"I see both of you now!" it exclaimed, "This is good sign! Do not fight with him! I tell you I wait long time for this—"

"Wait," Yugi interrupted, "You can see both of us now?"

"YES!" the ghost yelled. "Tell him what I say!"

Yugi jumped at the outburst; he'd never heard such a commanding voice escape the spirit before.

"…What…did it say?" Yami asked, raising an eyebrow at Yugi's reactions.

"It said that it can see both of us, instead of just one of us."

Yami frowned.

"Huh?"

"It told me that usually, it sees only one person at a time and nothing else around them—"

"shadows," the ghost interjected.

"—it sees _shadows _of what is actually around the person," Yugi corrected, "But whoever it can see at the time is the only thing that's clear."

"That's…really weird," Yami said, frowning, "I didn't think ghosts would see like that."

"It's not a ghost, though."

Yami glanced to the space where the ghost was.

"…What is it, then?"

"Um…" Yugi looked to the ghost, waiting for an explanation. But the ghost merely nodded to Yugi.

"Speak," it said.

Yugi made sure it knew he more than a little aggravated with it at this point, before turning back to Yami.

"It's…really weird how it described it, but basically, it's a spirit whose body is gone, but whose soul hasn't died yet. It's being blocked by…an evil, it says. There's some kind of evil that's keeping it from passing on to wherever we go when we die."

At this point, the glint of apprehension in Yami's eyes gave way to curiosity.

"…an evil?"

"Demon," the ghost said. Yugi turned to it.

"What?"

"This is what you call evil. It is a demon."

Yugi stared at the ghost for a moment, thinking of what he knew to be a demon. He'd never really thought of it before…he'd heard stories with demons in them, but he never really thought about them outside of that.

"Yugi?"

Yugi blinked, and shook his head.

"it says that the evil's a demon," he explained.

"And that it is living in Yami," the ghost prompted.

"And that it's living…inside you…" Yugi repeated.

Whatever he had been expecting Yami to do when he heard that, it was not what he actually did.

His hand immediately flew to his chest, clutching at it as tightly as he had in front of the library.

"Yami?" Yugi asked, noticing that Yami's breathing was staring to sound irregular.

Shit.

"Yami!" the ghost snapped, in that same tone that had startled Yugi before.

And even though he supposedly couldn't hear the ghost, he turned towards where it was floating, almost in a daze. The ghost then held its hand up, with its palm out to Yami.

"_Salgrati na!_" it commanded, "_Sene!_"

Yami snapped out of whatever episode he had been falling into, looking much paler than normal.

"What just happened?" he shot to Yugi, looking genuinely frightened, now. The expression was so uncharastic on him that it shocked Yugi.

"That is not good sign," the ghost said, "Do not call it by name—use 'evil', and it will not hear us."

"…It says that we should just say 'evil' instead of what it is. It's not supposed to hear us, that way."

If possible, Yami paled even more.

"You mean it almost came out again?" he asked, his voice faltering.

"I think so…" Yugi said, looking to the ghost for affirmation, "If that's what happened last time…"

The ghost nodded.

"Yes. I anger it then, and I burn Yami as result. I am sorry for this."

"It says that it was its fault last time, because it made the de—the evil angry, and you got burned because of it. He says he's sorry."

Yami looked to where the ghost was floating, looking very confused.

"What _are_ you?" he demanded, his eyes trying to find something in the empty air before him to focus on, "why do you know about this? Why can you stop it?"

At this, the ghost looked Yami in the eye, and said,

"I am who you are thinking I am, I know. I see it on you. I am why you are cursed like this."

Yugi repreated what it said, word for word.

At this, Yami's eyes narrowed, and he straightened.

"If you are who I think you are," he said, his voice suddenly even again, "Then you'll be able to tell me what this is."

And with that, he pulled his school uniform's collar aside, and Yugi saw gnarled, deformed skin, peeling and red. In the middle of the burn lay something small, glittering in the thin winter sun. It was this that Yami reached for, not even flinching as what revealed itself to be a gold chain graced over what Yugi was sure was sensitive skin. Slowly Yami he pulled it out, and as he did so, Yugi realized what it was;

The necklace. The one that Yami always wore, the one that he always fiddled with and kept under his shirt.

At the end of the golden chain, Yugi now saw, was a smally triangle—no, a pyramid shape. It was a small pyramid, with an eye on one side.

"That," said the ghost, "is my prison."

Once Yugi had repeated it, Yami let the necklace drop to his chest again; it didn't look as though he were expecting that as an answer. Yugi expected the shocked, frightened expression to resurface, but before it could get there, it was shoved down again in favor of something more calm: curiosity.

Again, Yami's eyes narrowed.

"You're the Pharaoh?" he asked.

At this, the ghost closed its eyes, an expression of immense relief spreading across its face.

"Yes," it said, "I am Pharaoh Atem. This is my name."

For a long moment after Yugi repeated the statement, none of them spoke. Yami merely stared at where the ghost was, and the ghost stared right back at Yami.

It was then that Yugi realized that they looked very much alike. Granted, Atem didn't have the hair that Yami did; it was down, and straight. But their faces were almost identical.

It was very strange.

What was even more strange, however, was when the ghost started fading away.

"A—atem?" he asked. Atem looked to Yugi, and gave him a warm smile.

"Yami is knowing what I want him to know. The rest is up to him. I leave now."

"What's happening?" Yami asked.

Yugi paused in his reply, and watched as he faded away completely.

"He's gone."

"But—!" Yami exclaimed, "but we were talking!"

Yugi shrugged.

"He said you know all that you need to know."

Yami looked to Yugi, the utterly confused expression taking his face over again.

"What? That doesn't make sense—"

"He told me that you were closest to the evil," Yugi said, "Therefore, you could stop it."

Yami looked into the distance, looking completely lost.

"But that means…that I could break the curse.."

"…I guess so," Yugi agreed.

For a long moment they stood there, silent in the afternoon sun. Yami seemed to be lost in a world all his own. Seeing what he had of this whole business, and knowing what he did, Yugi felt sorry for him; to have within him something so powerful that it could trap a soul from moving beyond life was…unimaginable, to him.

Yugi looked at his watch.

"It's almost four," he said. "School let out forty five mintues ago."

Yami blinked.

"…Oh," he said quietly.

And with that, Yugi turned around and started home, leaving Yami to his thoughts.

That was all he really could do, now. He'd told Yami what the ghost wanted to tell him. He'd done his deed.

Now he could walk away from it all, and go back to his small, depressing existence.

Undisturbed.

* * *

A/N: Just for the record, I really do not remember why I hadn't specified the ghost's gender. I had a reason for doing that, at the beginning, but now…I honestly don't remember what it was.

Strange, neh?

Ah, well. Game's up; it's a _boy_!

How cute.

Note: What the pharaoh says in a different langauage is not connected to any one language. I do not know ancient egyptian speak. What the pharaoh says is, in fact, complete gibberish.

Next up: Yami's confused. Not that this wasn't apparent already. But that's okay, because his confusion's slowly evolving, in mutant ways. I think next chapter it'll grow a third arm. But that's just speculation.


	30. The Sign

A/N: Haha, now I'm thinking of that Ace of Base song…even though it has nothing to do with THIS sign. Again, Joey dancing and singing pops into mind. This is getting scary.

On another note: check out how the Grandfather's talking in Arabic (the national language of Egypt), and not 'Egyptian', as my ignorant self been claiming the past 29 chapters. I should have looked it up ages ago; now I just look stupid. I'll admit it. And for that I apologize. Really, it's like saying Mexico speaks Mexican instead of Spanish.

Guh. Awful.

But life goes on.

Chapter title: The Sign

* * *

Impossible. 

Yami stared at the broken concrete before him, listening to Yugi's fading footsteps as he made his way home. His necklace rested on top of his shirt, not even touching his skin, and the words he wasn't sure he had spoken or simply imagined hearing echoed in his mind;

"_But that means…that I could break the curse…"_

"…_I guess so." _

Three thousand years of suffering, and it all came down to this: to an unused blacktop and a fading sun, catching the fiery shimmer of gold that never aged, sparkling with the luster of a time whose life should have been buried long ago within the tombs from whence it came.

"_He told me that you were closest to the evil. Therefore, you could stop it."_

He could stop it.

Stop what had haunted him for most of his life, what had killed his family before him, for generations too numerous to count. He could stop the stories of mindless fear and paranoia, of the pain, both physical and otherwise, that drove most of those before him to death or worse, if the demon so chose it.

Yami took a shuddering breath, and tried to calm down his racing heartbeat.

Isn't that what he wanted? From the time he was ten, barely understanding that which he was imprisoned by, did he look for a way out.

"_He said you know all that you need to know."_

Yami looked up, staring past the school and to the city that lay beyond.

No matter what had happened before…he knew. He knew what he needed to know to break free.

Yami let out a laugh and lifted the pyramid off his chest, letting it rest in the palm of his hand.

It still sounded impossible. He didn't think his parents would take too kindly to the idea, either.

Should he even tell them?

A part of him considered the necklace as his responsibility now, and therefore his to handle. If he wanted to keep this from them, then he had the right to. Right?

The obvious answer was no. But that was an answer that didn't take into account what they would think of him, or what he had been doing. What would they say to what Kaiba had told him? Would they even believe him, if he told them about what had just happened with Yugi and the pharaoh? Would they accuse him of lying?

They already had when Yami had told them about Kaiba threatening to set the demon on him in the first place…what would be different about this? Gramma would doubt him for sure…

Yami sighed. Whatever the case, he needed to get home. Mom and Dad would be wondering about him, anyway; it was way too late to blame his lateness on talking to Anzu, or something. Even though he had done that once before, he knew that they wouldn't take that easily as an excuse again. He'd have to think of something else…

* * *

"Why are you late?" 

Yami made sure the door was shut behind him, and pushed out the lie he had concocted on his walk home.

"I was in the library at school, and I lost track of time."

Dad paused on his way upstairs.

"I thought they tried to get everyone out of the school when it closed."

Yami shrugged.

"I was in the back. I guess they didn't see me, or something."

"Oh," Dad said, nodding. "Good thing you got out, then."

And with that, he headed up the stairs.

…Yami stood where he was, shocked. When had he gotten good at this?

"Is mine up there, too?" Mom called from the living room.

"Yes, they're both here," Dad said, shutting the closet next to Yami's room and heading back down the stairs, his and Mom's coats in hand.

"Where are you going?"

"Just to the grocery," Mom said, "And then to pick up Gramma and Granddad from the museum. But it might snow later this evening, so we're going to need these."

"Oh," Yami said. "Neat."

"We'll be back in a few," Mom said, "It shouldn't take long."

"Is it all right if I call Bakura?"

"Sure," Mom said, "Just don't make it too long, in case something happens; we'd want to get a hold of you."

"Right."

"See you in a few!" Dad said, taking the car keys off the table next to the door.

"'bye!"

And they were gone.

Yami let his backpack fall the rest of the way to the floor with a thud. For a moment he simply stood there, listening to the empty house around him. It seemed so different, suddenly. Like he was walking in a dream.

He made his way into the living room, sitting down slowly on the couch as though he might set something off if he moved too quickly. Even though consciously, he knew the only thing likely to explode right now was himself.

He almost didn't want to call Bakura, in case something slipped out. And considering everything that had happened today, that was a much bigger concern than usual. Usually he could get away with 'censoring' that which concerned the necklace from his life without notice. It didn't make him any better of a liar, though.

And Bakura knew it, too. Bakura knew him so well that he could read Yami like a book, and he caught on to the fact that Yami wasn't telling the whole story, sometimes. Most of the time, actually. It had made for some very awkward situations between the two of them. They had known each other for years; it wasn't a mystery to Yami when Bakura was disappointed, even if he was trying to cover it up.

Now, he felt like all he could talk about was the curse.

Sighing, Yami reached over the arm of the couch and picked up the phone, dialing Bakura's number from memory. He had a feeling he wasn't going to be feeling much more like himself than he did now anytime soon. He may as well give Bakura the call he'd promised him today, and get on with things.

As the phone was ringing, a stray thought fell into Yami's consciousness, long forgotten in favor of bigger things;

"_The only thing keeping you from this is you, you know."_

Anzu had said that…

"Hello?"

"H-hey, It's Yami."

"Ohmigod I was just going to call you!" Bakura exclaimed. "That's creepy!"

"Heh," Yami said, forcing out a laugh, "It's not like I haven't done it to you before."

"Yeah, but it's still creepy! I was just looking for you new number!"

"You didn't put it on a post-it on the fridge?"

"No, because I'm smart enough to use my hand, and then wash the pen off before writing it down somewhere else!"

"That _is_ smart. What did you want to call me for?"

"Okay—to put it in short terms, I feel like ripping certain people's brains out of their skull and they're not understanding why."

Yami raised his eyebrows; that was certainly gory. And there was only one thing that Yami could think of that would drive Bakura to desire such mutilation.

"Who dumped you now?"

"Oh, but it is _so_ more than just dumping. Get this…"

And Bakura launched into a very lengthy, drama-filled story that Yami only partially listened to. In a strange way, it was good to know he wasn't the only one with problems at the moment.

Not that he could ever envision himself having Bakura's kind of problems, but that really wasn't the point.

"So then, he tells me that he _really _just said that to make me feel bad about dumping him, even though _he_ dumped _me _in the first place. I told him he was getting obsessive, and then he starts acting all sorry for it. I could tell he was faking it, though."

"That's not good," Yami said.

"But _that's_ not the worst part," Bakura said.

"Oh?"

"No! I get to school the next day, and everyone is going on about how _I _dumped _him _and made him feel so much like shit that he couldn't play in that night's game!"

"Sounds kind of manipulative to me," Yami said.

"Exactly! And I tried to tell the rest of the team what really happened, since most of them came to me asking, and they wouldn't believe me! They all sided with _Malik_!"

"…wow," Yami said. Then he laughed. "I'm glad I left Dalton when I did, that's all I have to say."

"Just rub it in, why don't you?"

"Of course."

"Oh, you'd find a way out of the middle of the drama, Yami. Or I would, at least. Probably with more flare than you."

"Not to be conceited, or anything," Yami said.

"Yeah, I know."

Bakura sighed.

"But now I'm back to being single. _Again._"

"It's not a bad thing," Yami said.

"You've never dated. Your opinion doesn't count."

"Even though I've known you the longest?"

"Nope."

"I feel loved."

"That's nice. I'm still single."

"Fine. So much for comfort."

"Damn right," Bakura muttered. Then, he asked, "anyway, so what's wrong with you? You sound depressed, or nervous, or something."

Yami paused, and felt the clench of panic seize his already tightened chest. Even over the phone Bakura could sense something different.

Because right now, Yami felt more different than he had ever felt in his life.

"Yami?"

"…Yeah, actually," Yami said, shaking his head. "Sorry, I got distracted."

And before he really thought about it, Yami launched himself into the same old game he'd been playing since he was ten; censoring that which concerned the curse from Bakura, while leaving gaping gaps in the resulting story. He didn't like doing it. He didn't really want to do it, now—especially after last time, with the whole 'let him' thing.

Yami knew the only reason why he had brought that up was because he really had wanted to rant about how stupid and strange the real content of that conversation had been. As it was, he was stuck telling Bakura all that he could say without mentioning the curse. And even at that, he had let enough slip to make Bakura worry about Yami.

There were some times when Yami wondered if he should just tell him.

But he knew that he couldn't do it now; he had to figure out a few more things, first.

Like how he knew how to break the curse.

"…so what were you going to tell me?" Bakura prompted.

"Oh," Yami said, feigning distraction again, "You know what you told me about what Kaiba said before leaving Dalton?"

"Yes?"

"…I asked him about it."

"…_What!_"

Yami shrugged.

"I wanted to know. It was bugging me."

"So you just…walked up and asked…?"

"Yeah."

For a moment, Bakura didn't respond. And it was just long enough of a time that Yami started to regret saying anything in the first place. Not that he wasn't regretting it before—

"…what did he say?"

Inwardly, Yami sighed in relief. Thank goodness for Bakura's insatiable curiosity about anything and everything.

"He didn't really say much, actually," Yami said. "He just kind of froze. Then he gave me this look that was really weird…like he was hiding himself, but he couldn't do it completely…"

"You're insane."

Yami frowned.

"Why?"

"You don't just go up to someone and ask them that kind of thing, that's what!" Bakura said, "Of course they're going to wonder why you did it! That's the way to _not_ get answers out of people. Besides, I thought this was the guy you hated. Whatever happened to that?"

"I never _hated _him," Yami pointed out, "I just think he's an asshole that thinks only about himself."

But even as he spoke the words, Yami thought of the information that Kaiba had given him about the curse—valid information, as proved by the pharaoh's spirit. That wasn't very self-absorbed at all…

"Besides," he continued, shaking his head, "He kind of gave me an answer."

"Yeah," Bakura said, "Something to the effect of 'fuck off, I don't want to talk about it'. _That's_ an answer."

"Well, it's something! I just wanted to know what possessed him to say that!"

"Yami, it happened three years ago. Stop obsessing."

"I only found out about it last week!"  
"Still," Bakura replied, "You're obsessing."

"I am not!"

"Yes you are! It's creepy!"

"Am not!"

"Are too!"

"Am not!"

"Are too!"

"Am not!"

"Shut up! You are because I say so!"

"Oh, _that's_ a really good reason!"

"It's good enough for me! Now stay still while I get in my car and drive over there so I can hit you with something heavy!"

Yami started laughing. The statement was too ridiculous not to.

"I mean it!" Bakura said. Yami could tell he was trying not to laugh, though.

Suddenly, Yami heard a voice in the distance on Bakura's end of the line.

"Right!" Bakura called back.

"Ow!" Yami said, jerking his head away from the receiver.

"Sorry, Yami."

"Just make me deaf, why don't you?"

"I could if you wanted me to."

"Please don't."

"That's what I figured. Anyway, I've gotta go," Bakura said, "my mom needs the phone. Oh!"

"What?"

"What does that kid that you had that fight with look like? The one I was going to scare?"

"Oh, Joey?"

"Yeah."

"You're still going to do that?"

"Duh! Now more than ever! I need an innocent laugh or two at someone else's expense."

Yami shook his head. Some things would never change.

"He's got blond hair, and he hangs out with the really stupid people."

"Ah, yes. Anything else?"

"Not that I can think of. He's got a friend Jim that's on the Basketball team. He's the only one on the team that I really talk to all that much."

"So you're saying one of the stupid people?"

"What?"

"You said the only guy you talk to is the guy that's Joey's friend. That means that you're a stupid person, 'cause you can relate to the guy who's friends with the attractor of stupid people."

"…I never really thought about it that way before."

"You finally admit it," Bakura said, "I'm proud of you."

"What that I'm stupid?" Yami asked, in a flat tone.

"Maybe."

"…Thanks, Bakura."

"Of course. Now I really need to go. I'll see you tomorrow, though. Hopefully the Dalton team won't make life miserable…"

"They'd have to try pretty hard to make you miserable, Bakura. You'd take a pen to their eyes before that."

"Guess I'd better remember to bring a pen, then."

"…that's pretty bad."

"No kidding. Anyway, see you tomorrow."

"All right. Bye."

"Bye."

Yami waited for Bakura to hang up, before finally putting the phone down.

When he thought about it, it really wasn't a lot of information—after all, the ghost and Kaiba had told him the exact same things. But it was the impact of the statements, and the suggestion that what Yami had always taken to be solid and immovable was suddenly temporary and capable of change that made Yami feel as though he were floating, and he had nowhere to steady himself.

He felt as if his life were in the middle of a rockslide; everything had been perfectly fine, until it all had been shoved into motion by the attack in front of the library. And now, they were rolling so fast towards the bottom that they were going to shatter into a million irreplaceable fragments. There was no room for them to coast to a stop—not even a span of years from here and now could make what was up in the air now settle comfortably. Something was going to break and never be the same again.

And the demon was sure to know about this. And it was sure to act. Soon.

Yami got up from the couch, and headed upstairs. Suddenly, he felt like he couldn't stay still.

Did he really think he could pull this off? Was it really going to happen? Was the demon really stupid enough to have left some way out of the curse behind, after all these years? And was Yami really the one who was going to find it? Why was Yami so privileged? He'd nearly burned himself to death by trying to take the thing off so many times—he would think the demon would be extremely annoyed at him for that, to say the least.

Maybe that's why Yami almost blacked out again, when Yugi and the pharaoh had been talking to him.

Yami shivered; he'd tried to forget about the feeling he'd gotten from that since it happened. But now that the memory came to him, it made Yami remind himself of what he'd felt like during what Yugi had witnessed. And that same feeling had haunted him again when the demon had been mentioned that afternoon. He had just started to panic from feeling like his very being was being closed into a space too tight for it when it all the sudden was lifted from his consciousness.

That's when he'd realized that Yugi wasn't playing some kind of sick trick on him. That the spirit that Yugi kept looking to, where Yami saw only thin air, was real. And that it was the pharaoh that had been imprisoned for three thousand years.

Yami sat down in his desk chair, staring at the room around him. It didn't feel real, anymore. Everything about it seemed small, and petty. Just like Mom had said in that very doorway Yami was idly staring at now, at the beginning of the semester;

"_this is bigger than curfews and parties. Remember that."_

Yami let out a small laugh.

Forget curfews and parties; this was bigger than his life. Now more than ever, he understood exactly what that meant. This breaking of the curse could very possibly consume him—and very possibly in that same way that the demon had tried to suffocate him before.

Yami shivered again.

Was that really how it was going to end?

* * *

"_Read the texts again. You'll see what I mean."_

The papers were still on his bookshelf. Right there, on the other end of the room. They had made their way into the boxes moved into his room when they had moved here, instead of the ones meant for storage.

It was a place to start.

Yami got up from his desk chair and walked over to the bottom shelf of his bookshelf where they were stacked haphazardly. They were yellowed at the edges, and somewhat dusty, just because Yami never thought to dust his room. He'd have to think to clean it on a regular basis first, but that was a different matter. Carefully bringing them over to his bed, he set the stack down on his covers, pulled the title page off, and started to skim through the story he had tried so many times to forget.

As he read through story after story that had been recorded about the demon, he saw the parallels that Kaiba had been talking about. He didn't know how Kaiba's father had gotten a hold of these stories in the first place, but the evidence was here. Right in front of him.

It was hard to find a time when something drastic had happened and there wasn't another, unrelated person who saw it. The only ones that didn't have such evidence were the ones that the necklace bearers had written down themselves—and those were few and far between.

Why had he not noticed this before?

Yami don't know how long he sat there, staring at the writing he had thought he knew so well. Now, it was as though he were reading them for the first time.

Suddenly, there was a knocking on his door. He jumped, and looked up to see Dad standing in the doorway, hand still on the open door.

"I never shut that?" Yami asked idly.

"I guess not," Dad said, "because it was open when we got back."

"Really?" Yami asked, frowning. "I could have sworn I shut it…"

Then, Yami looked to Dad.

"When'd you guys get back, anyway?"

"We've been here for a while, Yami," Dad said, "you answered us when we told you we were back."

Yami blinked.

"I don't remember that…"

Dad gave out a laugh.

"Well, we did, and now dinner's on the table. So get down here."

"Right…" Yami replied distantly, sliding as carefully as he could off the bed without disturbing anything.

"Why do you have all that out, anyway?"

Yami shrugged, and looked off to the wall.

"I just thought of something, and I'm trying to remember where I read it, exactly."

He really didn't feel like telling Dad the entire truth, but he had to tell enough of it so that he looked believable, at least. He couldn't count on having the luck he did when he got home from school all the time. And it worked; Dad shrugged, and walked down the upstairs hall, saying,

"Come down for dinner."

Yami nodded and followed.

* * *

Dinner was quiet. Mom and Granddad exchanged some words, with the help of Gramma. Dad asked him a couple times if there was something wrong, but Yami just shook his head and denied it. There was nothing 'wrong' about any of it. It was just… 

He didn't know how to describe it, really.

Afterwards, Granddad went into the living room. Yami, who didn't need to read any more of the texts, followed him out, with the intentions of just going out on the back porch for a bit. He needed to think—

"curse."

Yami straightened. He knew that voice. He hadn't heard it for a very long time, but he knew it anywhere…But it couldn't be—

"Yami."

He turned around. Granddad was slowly walking over to Yami, and took the necklace in his hand when he got near enough. He frowned in concentration, as if he were trying very hard to say something.

"Curse," he strangled out.

"_Granddad_?" Yami whispered. This couldn't be happening. "You're _speaking_!"

"Curse… you break." He said. His voice was clearer now, more distinct. He looked straight into Yami's eyes, and held the necklace up.

"You break curse."

"Yeah," Yami replied, noticing that his voice was suddenly more unstable than it was before. "That's…that's what I want to do."

"You break curse, eh?"

Yami nodded.

Granddad said something in Arabic, and patted him on the shoulder.

And then he walked back into the kitchen.

Yami clutched the handle to the glass door behind him to keep his balance, as he was feeling very faint, all the sudden. He realized he had been clutching the necklace after Granddad had let go of it so tightly that his knuckles were white. When he let go, there was a very detailed imprint of the eye on his hand.

"Yami?"

Dad was standing in the doorway to the living room, looking concerned.

"I—I…" Yami tried to form a sentence, failing horribly. He couldn't think, he was so shocked.

"Yami, tell me what's wrong."

"I…" He tried again, "Granddad—he…he spoke English…"

Dad frowned.

"What?"

"H—He did!" Yami exclaimed, letting go of the door behind him, "He came up to me and started talking in English!"

"…What did he say?"

"Amir!"

Dad turned around to see Mom sticking her head out of the dining room, looking worried.

"Your father—"

Dad didn't wait for the rest of it, and hurried back in the dining room. Yami followed.

Granddad was sitting in a chair facing them, hand to his forehead. Gramma was staring at him, wide-eyed.

"What is it?" Dad asked.

Gramma explained to him in Arabic, although she used enough English for Yami to understand what exactly she was talking about.

"Did he say that to you, Yami? 'you break curse'?" Dad asked, when Gramma was done.

Yami nodded.

There was a silence among all of them. Yami lifted his hand, where the eye could still be seen against his skin. Granddad hadn't spoken English ever since the stroke. He hadn't spoken anything except Arabic. He'd been learning some of the languages he'd lost, but he hadn't been very successful at it, and lost the words as soon as they came. There was no way he could have memorized it from somewhere. There was no way he could have done that alone.

Something must have been helping him.

"Yami."

Yami looked to Dad.

"…Is there anything you've been talking about around Granddad that has to do with the curse? Have you mentioned it at all?"

Yami shook his head.

"I haven't been trying to teach him anything, if that's what you're asking."

Dad ran a hand through his hair.

"Are you sure?" Mom asked.

"Yeah," Yami said.

Gramma asked Granddad something. Granddad responded, looking somewhat confused.

"Your grandmother says that Granddad doesn't know what caused him to say that. That he doesn't know what it means—it just came out."

Mom's eyes widened.

"Was it…something he remembered saying before?"

Gramma shot the question at him. Granddad shook his head.

"He says he doesn't remember saying anything about breaking the curse before," Gramma said, "I don't remember that, either."

"What else could have happened, then?" Dad asked.

"You don't think something _possessed_ him…" Mom said, looking to Dad. "…Do you?"

Dad sighed heavily.

"I don't know."

After a moment Yami took a deep breath, and voiced his conclusion—frightening as it was.

"…Maybe it's a sign."

All four of them turned to him.

"A sign for what, Yami?" Dad asked.

A strange, eerie calm settled over Yami as he spoke next, and his mind suddenly felt clear.

"For what I've been wanting to do since I found out about all this—the curse, I mean."

Dad raised an eyebrow.

"And what's that?"

"You're not going to try and take it off…" Mom said.

"Yeah," Yami replied, "I'm going to try and break the curse."

A shocked silence followed his statement, as everyone in the room stared at him incredulously.

He took another deep breath, and started talking.

"I mean…It's got to end _sometime_, doesn't it?" he said, drawing from this strange calm inside his chest to propel him through what he was trying to say, "This has been going on for way too long—everyone's sick of it. _I'm_ sick of it, and I've only had thing for less than a decade."

Dad was shaking his head.

"Yami…" He said quietly, "the fact that you're tired of it doesn't change anything. I wish it did, but…it doesn't. You know that."

"But—"

"You know how slim the chances are that you could ever solve this. And I'm sorry if that's not what you wanted to hear, but this needs to be taken a little more seriously than what you're treating it like, right now."

"I _am_ treating it seriously!" he said, feeling extreme annoyance flare up within him, "I wouldn't have asked Kaiba what he knew about the curse if I weren't treating it seriously!"

"You did _what_?" Mom asked. Inwardly, Yami cringed; so much for not telling Mom and Dad anything.

But then again, he hadn't been banking on Granddad's sudden English, either. Now, given the situation, it would be stupid to hide it.

"I asked Kaiba what he knew about the curse," Yami said. "And he told me stuff that I didn't know before."

"Yami, we've been over this," Dad said, starting to sound exasperated, "Kaiba is _not_ a trustworthy source! Not after what happened freshmen year—"  
"He was telling the truth!" Yami retorted, "he wasn't making it up!"

"Oh, _really_?" Mom asked, her tone sarcastic, "Did he _tell_ you it was true? Is that why it's so believable?"

"No!" Yami exclaimed, insulted that Mom would think he was that dim, "He told me about this—this witness that always sees things that they're not supposed to, because they're not related to the curse. And I looked in the texts today while you guys were gone, and it's true! There are always people that see something that they shouldn't! And when I came home with this burn around my neck was when Yugi and I were going to the library to work on that world history project; he saw me panic!"

For a moment, they all simply stared at him incredulously. Then—

"_What!" _

Yami jumped.

"What!" he said, turning to Mom, "there was nothing I could do! It just started burning—"

"But you explained this to him afterwards, right? Please tell me you covered this up."

"I—I didn't—"

Mom put her hands over her face.

"So there's someone walking around your high school that saw your necklace burning you for no seeable reason?" Dad asked. "That's _really _smart, Yami—"

"_He saw the ghost of the pharaoh!_" Yami shouted, "How am I supposed to explain _that_!"

A silence.

"The ghost…of the pharaoh?" Gramma asked. "How do you know it was the pharaoh, Yami?"

Yami shoved down his surprise that Gramma wasn't yelling at him for talking to Kaiba, and answered her question.

"When I felt the necklace burning and started to panic, I saw this…figure in the distance. And when I explained it to Yugi, he'd seen it too; it was this ghost that's been following him since the beginning of the semester—when I came to Domino. And apparently this ghost convinced Yugi to get it to talk to me, because after school today, it did. And it…told me that it was the pharaoh."

Yami absently rubbed the spot where the necklace had dug in; it was starting to hurt, now.

"He…he said that I knew everything I needed to know to solve the curse."

For a long moment, no one spoke. Yami started into space, mind blank, and only focused his eyes again when Dad shifted in his chair, and sighed.

"There is a reason why, over four thousand years, this _never_ got solved," he said. "Many, many people have worn the necklace like you do now. And many of those same people have been just as eager as you to try and get it off. Some have seen others die at the hands of the demon's power. Others have had fingers burnt to the bone. I've been electrocuted. You have no fingerprints on three of your fingers—not to mention whatever scar you're going to have on your neck when that's done healing. These are all how we were repaid for trying to change what we thought we could, instead of just accepting the fact that this is, for our family, a way of life."

Yami noticed that Dad's voice became more and more dead, as he talked.

"You've read what can happen," he said.

Yami frowned.

"Besides," Dad continued, "What if the pharaoh doesn't know everything? He's only a ghost—"

"But he's not really a ghost, though," Yami said, "he never actually died—"

"Whatever he is!" Dad snapped. "He's been trapped in a doorway to another dimension for the past three thousand years! Do you think he's in a position to have learned everything? We don't know if he's even coherent! He could be delusional, for all we know!"

Yami shut his mouth. He hadn't thought about that.

"And what about the consequences, Yami? Even if you do break the curse, there's still going to be a demon out there who will be furious! And guess who it's going to come after first? Not to mention the fact that it might decide to just permanently take up residence here and destroy what we know to be home! Do you really want to see this neighborhood's souls eaten just because you don't want to get burned anymore?"

"_Dad!_" Yami shouted, shocked, "I'm not doing this because I get burned! Of course I can deal with that! That's the easy part! I'm not _that _stupid!"

"Then what _are_ you doing it for, Yami!" Dad shouted back, "Can you tell me that much?"

"What if it works? What if it meant that no one would ever have to worry about this again?"

"You're playing with fire when you've got gas on your hands! There's no _way_ this is going to work!"

"How do we know? This has never happened before! As far as we know, this is the closest someone has come to solving this! Don't you think that means something!"

"It means suicide!" Dad said, slamming his hand down on the dining room table, "You try this, you're not going to live past your kid's tenth birthday!"

Yami didn't respond to that right away. He hadn't thought of that, either.

Then again…

"Do you really think after all the times I've tried to take it off I'm safe?"

Dad looked away.

"Look," Yami continued, "If this doesn't work, I'll be only one that dies after I pass the necklace on—"

"But how do you know that, Yami?" Dad asked. "You yourself have read in those stories how friends and family have been punished as well as the person themselves."

Yami didn't say anything. Dad shifted in his chair.

"It's better to live with the pain that we all have been cursed with," he said, "and make something out of our lives that is worthwhile than to try to fight it. I'd rather see you live your life the way you want to live it than to give yourself away to a monster that thinks nothing of you. You have more of a chance of making a difference if you live with the curse than if you try to break it. Do you see why I'm against this now?"

Yami nodded silently.

"Is it still worth the rest of your life to mess with this?" Dad asked.

Yami was still.

"Yami?" Dad asked, after a moment.

"Is family worth it?" Yami asked quietly.

"…What?"

He looked up to Dad.

"Sure, I don't know them yet, or even if they'll exist. But if this works…I'll be giving them what I'd want them to have most—freedom from the curse. I mean," Yami shrugged, "if I'm ever going to have a family and all that, I don't want to be thinking about a necklace."

He picked the pendant off his chest, and held it in his palm.

"It's a piece of gold. It shouldn't be ruling my life, or anyone else's. People are worth more than that."

He looked up again to Dad.

"right?"

For a long moment, Dad simply looked at Yami. And Yami looked back, wondering about where this conversation had suddenly turned. Essentially, he was sacrificing himself to give freedom to those who would come after him.

He was willing to die for people he had no way of ever knowing. Die so that they could live whatever life they chose to, free of the confines of the necklace.

Yami tried to fight the sudden lump of nervousness and nausea that formed in the pit of his stomach, taking a calming breath and letting the necklace fall back onto his shirt.

Finally, Dad slowly nodded.

"Yes," he said quietly. "People are much more than that."

He sighed heavily, and ran a hand through his hair.

"I…guess there's not much more to say about this, now."

He then got up, and walked past Yami out of the room, saying,

"I'll be out on the porch."

Mom followed him, after a moment. Yami looked to Gramma, who had her hands clasped in front of her, obviously thinking. About what, Yami could only guess. Granddad was looking at him with a small smile on his face.

Yami wondered, for a brief moment, if he perhaps had understood what they'd been saying.

After all, right now… anything seemed possible.

* * *

Yami could have counted the words he said the next day on one hand. No one bothered him about it either; not even Jim. And so he floated through the day, feeling like he did after school the day before; he was simply reacting to things, watching the world idly through a haze of thoughts about things entirely unrelated to school. 

It seemed only a few moments between when Yami was getting out of bed the next morning, and when he was in the car, heading back to the school for the game that evening.

Mom and Dad dropped him off there, with instructions to call him when he was done. Yami suggested walking on his own, but it was only a half-formed effort. Besides, Mom reminded him, it was cold enough to snow. Yami agreed to that, and hurriedly got out of the car when they got there, waving goodbye as he rushed to get away from the biting air that surrounded him.

* * *

A/N: Oh, the fun that the climax of a story brings! Hee hee! I didn't realize how much I'd planned for this chapter until I wrote it all out, but this is pretty long, for one of my own chapters. The longest yet, perhaps. But I'm not going to go through the other 29 and look.

Next up: the basketball game! With everyone you know and more!


	31. The Game

A/N: All right, so it's a little later than I planned on having it out. And as such, I will pull out my most frequent excuse; life got in the way again.

But I've managed to write defensively, despite the odds. And I stand victorious.

Enjoy, everyone.

Chapter title: The Game

* * *

_Demon (n): (1) an evil sprit. (2) In Ancient Geek mythology; A supernatural being of a nature intermediate between that of gods and men; an inferior divinity, spirit, or genius (including the souls or ghosts of deceased persons)._ (1) 

Ghosts of deceased persons…

He'd never thought of that before…

He didn't know why he was still thinking about this at all, really. He was done.

…Right?

"Yugi."

Grandpa had come up beside him.

"Is it time to go?" Yugi asked.

A nod.

"You can stay if you want to, though."

Yugi tapped the side of the dictionary, staring at the small print.

The orange light of the late evening sun filtered through the window before them, giving the large, old book on its stand before them an ominous glow.

How fitting.

Slowly, Yugi shook his head.

"No," he said, "Let's go."

* * *

Everything seemed small… 

Yami pulled on his tennis shoe, lacing it up more tightly than he needed to. He thought about loosening it up a bit, but he never acted on it—mainly because of what he heard on the other side of the lockers;

"Hey, Jim."

"Yeah?"

"You know what's going on with Joey lately?"

"…what do you mean?" Jim asked.

"Well, he's a lot more quiet all the sudden. And, I don't know, he's just acting different. It's really weird."

"…oh," Jim replied.

And it was left at that.

Yami paused in the middle of lacing up his second shoe. How strange…

He really didn't have time to think about it too deeply; Coach came in a couple moments later, yelling at them about how they still needed to warm up.

Although he stopped Yami as he walked by, and let the others pass him as they filed out into the gym.

"Yes, coach?"

Coach eyed Yami's shoulders.

It was only then that Yami realized that his burn—which was still very painful—was showing.  
"Oh, um…I spilled some oil on myself while cooking."

Coach gave him a skeptical look.

"…What were you cooking?"

"…Um…"

Shit. He didn't even know what would constitute heating oil on a stove…

"You going to be all right out there, with that?"

"Y—Yeah," Yami said, "It looks worse than it feels."

"You sure? I don't want you hurting yourself."

Yami nodded, swallowing the hot lump of fear that had just jumped into his throat.

"I won't. I'll be fine."

* * *

Yugi didn't know why the definition stuck so well to his memory, but he found that he was still mulling over it as he sat at his desk, bent over his homework. Or, more specifically, that stupid final project for Mr. Dither's class…he _really_ hated working in partners… 

The latter part of what the dictionary said especially intrigued him. After all, the only thing Yugi thought of when he thought of a demon was a little red-eyed monster cackling evilly in one's face as they did something nightmarish.

It had never occurred to him that a former person could be a demon…

It did change things, though. After all, if this demon used to be a person, or a genius…there might be a way to get rid of it...

Yugi shivered, and was about to return to his homework when he paused.

He vividly remembered turning up the heat when he came upstairs. And shutting the curtains to his window…

Slowly, he swiveled in his desk chair to the opposite corner of the room.

"What are you doing here?"

Atemu ventured closer to Yugi out of the dark where he had appeared, his voice hushed and urgent.

"I know you are thinking I am done with you!" he said, "But I am not seeing this coming, last time."

Yugi frowned.

"…What's happened?"

"Ehm, how do I say," Atemu muttered frantically, looking away. He seemed more unnerved than Yugi had ever seen him before.

He put his pencil down.

"It is…feeling, I am thinking—it is angry now. I think it is thinking something happening from yesterday, when I talk to Yami—I think it is knowing I talk to Yami."

For a moment, Yugi just stared at the pharaoh.

If what happened in front of the library was any indication of the demon's powers…

This wasn't good at all.

* * *

Maybe it was the anticipation of playing against Dalton—a team he already knew was going to beat them to a bloody pulp. That's what he wanted to believe he was feeling nervous and strange about, even though deep down he knew it wasn't true— 

"Yami!"

Yami caught the ball thrown to him.

Game. He should be thinking about the game. That was all he needed to think about right now. That, and what the hell you cook with hot oil…

He threw the ball on.

* * *

"So…the thing that almost killed Yami before.…might show up at the game?" 

"Yes," the pharaoh said wearily, sitting down on Yugi's bed. He then shook his head, muttering something that Yugi could only guess was his native language; it came out in the same intonations that he used when he tried to speak English.

"…What would happen if the de—it came to the game?" Yugi asked. "Would it do what it did before?"

The pharaoh nodded.

"If this happen," he said, "I will not be hurt, but…it would be long time before I can talk to someone again and have this chance. Evil is powerful now; more powerful than in long, long time."

Even though he was hiding it behind a calm tone of voice, Yugi could sense by his nervous movements that he was far from it.

Yugi would dare to say he was frightened.

"And you still need me to tell Yami anything that he might need to know?"

Atemu took a deep breath, and nodded.

"…Yes."

* * *

"Come an, Hondah! You're gonna make us late!" 

Honda stopped on the front walk up to his house, and started walking slower.

"What's wrong with my walking?"

"Your gettin' left behind is what's wrong with it!"

"Like you would," Honda laughed, picking up his pace again.

"How do you know, hah? I could be feelin' really mean today—"

"Geez, Joey!" Honda interrupted, walking around the front of the car, "How loud can that radio get?"

"Ah, sorry 'bout dat," Joey said, and ducked his head back inside his beater of a car to turn the volume down. Meanwhile, Honda had walked around to the other side of the car, and had gotten himself situated in the passenger's seat.

"Since when did you care about being on time, anyway?"

"Since people started ta care about basketball again, dat's when," Joey replied, as the car jerked into motion. "We gotta get a good seat at dis one. Nat ta mention parking's gonna be a nightmare."

"It's against Dalton, right?"

"Yup," Joey replied, "Best team around heah."

"Isn't that where Yami was before?"

"Yeah, dat too. Jim says he's pretty good."

"Huh," Honda said.

Then, he made a face of disgust.

"Yuck," he said, switching the radio off.

"What was that?" Joey asked with a laugh.

"Shit, that's what. My mom listens to that crap."

Joey shrugged.

"I wasn't even payin' attention ta what was playin'."

For the briefest moment, Honda thought about commenting on the statement.

But then he thought better of it, and let it drop.

* * *

"I'm going to the school," Yugi announced, "I'll be back in a couple hours." 

Grandpa looked up.

"Why?"

"There's a basketball game there, tonight. Yami asked me to come, he's on the team."

Grandpa peered at him from over the papers stacked around him on the kitchen table, trying to find traces of a lie, Yugi knew.

And for once, Yugi simply stared back, letting Grandpa see whatever was there.

"Call when you're done," he said finally, not taking his eyes off Yugi's, "I'll come pick you up."

"…Thanks," Yugi said, appreciative of the gesture. He then made his way to the stairs, and had gotten down the first couple of steps before Grandpa's voice stopped him.

"Yugi."

Yugi turned.

"Yeah?"

"Have you…seen that ghost again?" Grandpa asked slowly.

Yugi paused in his answer. A cold breeze wafted up from the doorway to the shop, chilling him through his open jacket.

"No," he said, quietly,

"I haven't seen it at all."

* * *

"_Man_, it's cold out heah!"

"That's what you get for forgetting a jacket, genius," Honda said, shutting the passenger door.

"I fell asleep!" Joey said, "I didn't realize it was dis late! I'm surprised the thing hasn't started already!"

"That's what alarm clocks are for," Honda said.

"Yeah, mine broke a while ago," Joey muttered, locking the car.

For a moment, Honda stood where he was, looking at Joey.

"What?" Joey shot, seeing Honda's expression, "I just haven't gotten anotah one yet."

"Joey—"

"'m fine, Honda," Joey said firmly, walking between some cars, and following the rest of the crowd filing into the gym. Honda caught up to him, and tried to talk again.

"but—"

"Drahp it, all right?" Joey cut off. "I don't like talkin' about it."

Honda thought for a moment. Then, he shrugged.

"All right," he said, resigned. "I can't say I didn't try—"

"Oh, sorry," Joey said.

For he hadn't been paying close attention to where he was walking, and had run into a girl making her way to the gym.

"That's all right," she said absently, glancing at Joey.

Then, she did a double take.

"…Hi," she said.

"…Hi…" Joey said, looking the girl up and down. She was very pretty.

For a moment they just stared at each other. She had very brown eyes.

"Um," Joey said, "have I…seen you before?"

"Probably not," she said. "I'm just here for the game."

"…Oh…"

* * *

He felt like running miles and sleeping forever at the same time, waiting in aggravating anticipation until that dark cloud of foreboding revealed itself for what it was, and left him be.

"You have more of a chance of making a difference if you live with the curse than if you try to break it."

What kind of difference could he make when he felt like this? He couldn't even focus on the ground before him properly. He didn't even know how he was going to make it through this game without losing it. Not to mention that he felt weaker than he'd felt in a long time…

"You all right, Yami?"

Yami looked up. Jim looked a little worried.

"Oh," he said vaguely, giving his head a shake. "It's…nothing."

"Tired?"

"…yeah…"

* * *

"I'm going inside," Honda said, "Brett will have found seats somewhere, probably." 

"Oh, uh…yeah…I'll be theah in a minate."

"Sure," Honda said, walking away.

The girl gave Joey a half-smile.

"So you're from New York?"

"Huh?" Joey asked blankly.

"You sound like you have an accent," she explained.

"Ah, well, yeah," Joey said, "I was theah for a little bit. Nat much, though. Mostly I picked it up from my family."

"Oh," she said, "That's still pretty neat."

Joey shrugged.

"I guess."

An awkward silence.

"So, um…which team are you going to root for?" the girl asked.

Joey shrugged.

"Well, I've gat some friends from Domino, but Dalton's really good. So I guess I'm heah for both. What about you?"

The girl shrugged.

"I'm here for Dalton. I don't know much about Domino, really. I've never even been here before."

"So ya go ta Dalton?"

The girl nodded.

"Yeah, I do. Well—I go to Phillips, which is a part of Dalton. Dalton's an all-boys school."

"Really?" Joey asked, "Didn't know that…."

* * *

Yugi pulled his coat more tightly around him, and started to walk faster. A part of him was still surprised at the fact that he actually agreed to go to this game. But at the same time…he felt sorry for the pharaoh. This was his one glorious chance to end the pain that he'd been feeling for so long—longer than Yugi could even imagine living—and it had been jeopardized in a way that he wasn't expecting at all.

Or maybe he had been.

…He'd ask later. After all, he had a couple of other questions he wanted answered.

Like which dynasty the pharaoh ruled in. Or just a general when; who was before him, all that. Maybe he'd be able to find him in a book, somewhere; there were enough books on the subject to cover a continent with, he was sure…

As he passed the patch of grass right before the schools' tall hedge out front started, Atemu stopped.

Amazingly enough, given the temperatures of the evening around them, Yugi felt the pharaoh's cold absence from his side and paused on the sidewalk, looking back. The only people in sight weren't paying attention to Yugi anyway; he could afford to seemingly stare off into the distance for a moment.

"What?" he asked quietly.

"Do you sense…cold, Yugi?"

Yugi just nodded. It was threatening to snow tonight, after all.

"…I do not feel temperature," Atemu said, his voice small, and distant. "I am spirit. I always feel same. Yet now…I am cold."

He held his hand up in the air, facing towards the patch of grass, as though he were reaching for something.

"Is something there?" Yugi asked.

The pharaoh's hand paused.

"I am seeing…memory…"

Yugi frowned.

"…You can see memories?"

"Only sometimes," Atemu replied, "if it is strong."

He put his hand down.

"I do not know why. It is gone now."

"…whose was it?" Yugi asked. "Yami's?"

Atemu shook his head.

"It is from you," he said simply.

Yugi looked to the patch of grass again. And he knew exactly what Atemu had seen.

"_Get UP, Midget! You don't want me ta make ya!"_

"_Why not?"_

_Bam._

"_That's why! Get up!"_

…

"_I just don't want to talk about it."_

"_It looks like you need to."_

_"I will when I want to."_

_When hell freezes over…_

Yugi turned around abruptly.

"Come on," he said shortly.

"But—"

"Do you want to get to the game or not?" Yugi snapped. "I could just turn around right now and go home—"

"Yugi—"

"What?" Yugi snapped, rounding on the pharaoh. He seemed shocked.

"Is this happening for long time? This…what I see?"

Yugi's eyes narrowed.

"If it only happened once, it wouldn't be strong enough for you to see, would it?"

Yugi was starting to see the family resemblance between him and Yami, distanced by thousands of years as it was. They both had that brainless idiot look about them; it's just that Yami seemed to wear it as his expression of choice.

"What?" Yugi asked, "Does this come as a surprise?"

For a long moment, the pharaoh just stared at Yugi, who was getting more angered by the moment. Of all the things he could have seen, it had to be that…

"…Let us go," Atemu said finally, "There will be time later for this."

"Later!" Yugi asked, forgetting his voice volume for a moment, "There's nothing more to talk about—"

"I am wanting to go to this game now, in case something is happening," Atemu interrupted, "Now you are alone. Do not talk to me now. You come to game alone for fun, yes?"

Yugi just glared at the pharaoh. Why had he walked out into the freezing night again?

Oh, yeah. Because he felt bad for a spirit that couldn't die since whatever-it-was B.C.

He started walking down the sidewalk again.

"…Yeah," he said flatly,

"fun."

* * *

"So…you meeting someone heah?"

"No," the girl sighed.

Joey raised his eyebrows.

"Dat's kinda strange, watching a game by yourself."

The girl looked off to the side.

"Yeah, well, I'm pissed at a bunch of people lately that I would normally go to something like this with, so…" She shrugged, "Looks like I'm a loner."

"…oh."

"We should probably go in," the girl said, "It's getting close to starting, anyway."

"Yeah," Joey replied. "And it's kinda cold…"

The girl gave out a laugh.

"Try standing out here in a skirt."

"Uhm, not planning on that."

"Come on," the girl said with a smile, "You know you want your legs frozen off."

"…Yeah."

They started walking. They could hear the noise in the gym from outside. Just before they got to the door, Joey was struck with an idea.

"Hey, um…"

The girl stopped, and looked to Joey. Her eyes were _really _brown…

"Um," Joey looked away, feeling his face start to get red. Why was he acting like this? He never acted like this around a girl! Not since middle school! Why the hell was he doing it now!

What was so different about her?

"If you want, you could sit with us," he blurted out. "My friends and I, I mean."

The girl raised her eyebrows.

"Really?"

"Yeah," Joey said, "They're kinda loud, but…"

"You figure it's better than watching alone?" the girl guessed. Joey saw she was smirking.

"Y—yeah," Joey stammered. "Something like that. I mean, if you don't want to, then that's fine too—"

"Sure."

Joey blinked.

"Huh?"

"I said 'sure'."

"…Oh," Joey said, "all right."

And he held open the door for her.

* * *

Once Yugi got inside, he didn't really care where he sat. As long as he was out of the line of fire of any bad jokes or other attention, he was fine. He wasn't really here to watch the game, anyway.

He noticed a couple people staring strangely at him, as he climbed the bleachers to the most barren spot, way up in the back. He ignored them—and after whispering about how strange it was to see him there, they went back to cheering on the teams, as they came out.

Once he got to the furthest, most desolate corner, Yugi leaned his head against the painted wall behind him. He was still extremely unnerved that the pharaoh could see his memories. Even worse, he hadn't remembered thinking of that when he was walking by there…

Was he thinking about it subconsciously, or something? Was that what the pharaoh picked up on?

Yugi closed his eyes. He'd rather not think about it right now. He really didn't want to be here…

"Tell me if anything happens," he muttered.

"Tired?"

"No," Yugi said, "I'm just going to be bored out of my mind, that's all."

"…So why are you here?"

Yugi opened his eyes. That wasn't Atemu's voice. And he'd said that he wouldn't talk, once they had gotten inside the building.

Crap.

Quickly, he sat up to see a girl looking at him, sitting only a few feet from him. Had he not noticed her when he had sat down?

He never did that…

"…I, um…I—I came here because my friend roped me into it," Yugi said, feeling strangely caught off-guard, "He's…on the team."

"Really? That's how I ended up here, too. I don't know a thing about basketball."

"…Ah," Yugi said. He was glad the explanation didn't seem too odd. Even if it didn't shed his feeling of strange discomfort…

"So who got you to come? Are they from Domino or Dalton?"

"They're from Domino," Yugi said.

"So you go here?"

"Yeah," he said. _Unfortunately…_

"Who got you to come?"

"…Yami," Yugi said, deciding the truth couldn't do any harm—even if it was a very stretched truth.

"Huh," the girl said, "That's who got me to come, too. Well, he invited me—told me when it was, and everything. And I had nothing else to do tonight, so," she shrugged, "Here I am."

"You know Yami, then?" Yugi asked. He didn't know why he wanted to know, or even if it was all that important.

The question just kind of fell out.

"Yeah. He's in my German class."

"Ah."

A silence. Someone was announcing something over the intercom.

"I'm Anzu, by the way."

Yugi looked over to the girl. It was obvious she didn't know who he was—at least by face. But she probably would recognize his name.

…Unfortunately.

"…I'm Yugi," he said. "Yugi Motou."

* * *

"So, what's your name again?"

"You never asked me in the first place," the girl said.

"Oh," Joey said, "I…guess I didn't."

"It's Yuki."

"Yuki…" Joey repeated, "I like that."

Yuki smiled, and walked into the gym.

When they had gotten to where the rest of his friends sat, Joey introduced her to everyone.

"…an' I'm Joey," he finished, sitting down. Yuki sat down next to him, saying,

"Well, you guys look like a lively bunch."

"Yep!" Honda exclaimed on Joey's other side, "It is our duty to make the most noise as possible!"

Yuki nodded.

"I can believe that," she said.

Joey would have tried to think of something else to say to Yuki, instead of just gawking at her, but the game was about to start. True to their word, Honda and everyone else got up and started cheering when Domino's team came out. Jim gave a nod in their direction. Brett imitated a girl's voice and shouted, "I love you Jimmy!" when the noise had died down a little.

And just before the referee let go of the ball, Joey felt a tap on his shoulder. He looked over to Honda.

"'bout time you stopped moping about Mai dumping you. And she's hot," he whispered.

"Ssh!" Joey hissed, elbowing his friend in the side. After all, Yuki was sitting right there. And Joey was pretty sure she heard, too. She didn't say anything, though.

She just leaned forwards, smiling that small smile, and watched the chaos on the court quietly, not making a sound or movement as the game progressed.

* * *

There they were. Lined up and ready to go, Dalton's team stood before Yami, looking formidable. And they really had every reason to. Yami knew how they worked; he knew that they made an unusually good team together, and that he wasn't nearly as good as these guys. Sure, he could keep up with them—he'd worked up to that point during countless lunch hours, before he had left Dalton.

But he couldn't beat them. For as fun as it was to play on Domino's team, they weren't a match for Dalton, no matter what Coach said.

Another problem Yami was just now thinking of, as he stared down the faces he knew so well, was that everyone that had ever held a grudge against him was on this court. None of it had been his fault. But with these guys, it really didn't matter that his only problem was that he had just been best friends with the wrong person every time things got ugly.

Truth was, he actually liked hanging out with Bakura more than he would like trying to keep the peace between the rest of them, which was damn near impossible. But they stuck together through it all as a team, which was mildly admirable.

It wouldn't help him now, though.

There went the ball.

Here goes nothing…

* * *

"Yami's mentioned you a couple times."

Yugi turned to her.

"We sit next to each other in class," She explained.

"Ah," he said. He turned to watch the game again. Then, after a moment, he asked in more quiet voice,

"What has he said about me?"

"…Well," Anzu said, "he's mentioned that you're on a project of some kind together…and that's about it, really."

She was lying.

Yugi could hear it in her voice.

Which opened up the question of what he _had_ told this girl.

"huh," he said aloud.

Nothing was said after that for a while.

* * *

He knew. He was the only one who had a chance of cutting off Dalton's plays before they fell through. But he always ended up in the wrong spot, and was forced to stand and watch as play after perfected play smacked through Domino's defenses, and landed Dalton right where they wanted to be.

Not that he was making too much of an effort to stop them—both he and they knew he could have done a lot more to block Dalton's movements. They kept glancing at him, wondering when he was going to pull out the ability that they knew he had in him. Malik especially.

But right now, Yami just didn't care. He'd let them have Domino on a silver platter, if they so desired it. He didn't want anything to do with them, anymore. Like he had told Bakura; he was glad he had left when he did.

And right now, all he wanted was for this thick, suffocating tension in his chest to just go away, so that he could breathe normally again…

* * *

"I don't think our team's too smart in the strategy department."

Yugi blinked, and looked to Anzu. That had been a strange thing to say…

Strange enough spur on Yugi's curiosity.

…if even only remotely.

"…How so?"

"Well, Dalton seems to be going in specific patterns. And it looks like they've been playing so long that they have a certain code going with that one guy and the rest of the team. Every time he makes a certain motion, they respond."

Yugi searched out the leader of Dalton's team, and followed him for a while. Anzu was right.

"Looks like nodding to his twin is a sign."

"—and the rest of them are watching for it!" Anzu said. Sure enough, once their captain had given his brother a nod, they all started moving as one to different spots on the court. Anzu laughed, as she watched their progression.

"That's amazing. I wonder how they calculate out the points?

"Well, the score's on the board over there," Yugi said, leaning back again, "Don't know how they figure it out, though."

Anzu leaned forwards, and grimaced when she saw the difference in the numbers.

"…ouch."

It certainly did seem that way; every time Yugi had glanced down to what was happening below, he'd seen Yami looking somewhat dazed. And he supposedly was the best player on the team.

That's what he'd heard, anyway.

But he knew that rumors weren't always the best thing to go by.

* * *

God, his burn was hurting. Should he even be playing? Why was he thinking of this now? Surely that couldn't be why he felt faint, all the sudden…

It passed only for a split second; a moment of blurry vision and hazy hearing, just long enough for Yami to realize the change—and then it all snapped back to normal.

He only thought about it after he'd managed to get the ball through the hoop. He didn't know what the score was; he just went for it. And then he'd realized had hadn't seen the hoop clearly.

"_He could be delusional, for all we know!"_

And why did Malik keep glaring at him like that? What had Bakura done to him now? And where was he, anyway? Yami didn't have time to scan the crowd, but he was pretty sure he hadn't seen him around. And usually he would have been able to spot him by now, with that albino hair of his…

"Yami!"

Yami turned just in time to see the ball land in Malik's hands right next to him, then shoot off to someone else. So much for blocking that one…

He could hear Jim swearing from where he was, too. Were they about to score?

Yeah, they did.

"_Curse… you break." _

Yami gave his head another shake. Why wasn't he thinking straight? Game! Think about the game!

"_You break curse."_

"Dammit—!"

* * *

Yami seemed to be getting more disoriented as the game went on.

Did that mean something?

Yugi looked over to his right, where he could feel Atemu's presence.

"I am not sensing anything," Atemu said, when he noticed Yugi, "Right now, I only hear noise, far away. It must be very loud, this basket-game."

Yugi nodded slightly, so that Anzu wouldn't notice. He would have corrected him on the name of the sport, but he didn't want to seem schizophrenic.

Although he'd had the thought that it really didn't matter; no one would be all that surprised anyway.

He sighed, and leaned his head against the wall again.

What a blast this was.

Really.

* * *

"Whoa! You guys see that burn on Yami?"

"You just noticed that?" Honda asked.

"Yeah…?"

"Dude," Brett said, "That was the first thing Honda said when they came out."

"Really?" Joey asked Honda.

Honda nodded.

"oh…"

Meanwhile, Yuki had turned her attention back to the game. Joey watched her movements out of the corner of his eye, smooth and graceful, in an almost eerie way. She seemed concerned.

"It's right around his neck…" She muttered, so quietly that Joey almost didn't hear her. Although considering that they were at a basketball game, she had probably said it in a normal tone of voice.

"Yeah, that's pretty weird," Joey agreed, "How do you get a burn around your neck like that? Did he try to put something an, or somethin'?"

"Who knows?" she said. "He looks sick..."

Joey shrugged.

"Ah, well, if he is it can't be bad enough to keep him from playing. Otherwise he wouldn't be heah."

"I don't' know about that," Yuki said. "He might just not want to miss a game."

"True," Joey agreed. "We can just hope he lasts out 'till the end, then."

"Yes, we can," Yuki agreed.

"Don't think he will, though…"

* * *

He could see it in his eyes.

Malik wanted him to fight back. He wanted him to use what he knew Yami knew how to do. But not out of any benefit for Yami's team, who was so far behind that it was pathetic. No, Yami knew him better than that; he wanted to beat Yami down when Yami was seemingly playing at his best, just to prove that he was better. That's why Malik did anything competitive.

And that's why Yami hadn't been complying. Ever since it had clicked that that's what the glares had been about, Yami hadn't been giving his all. He was pretty sure everyone knew, too.

"There is a reason why, for over three thousand years, this never got solved."

Yami shook his head, and looked around the court.

He was doing it again.

Yami looked at the scoreboard. It was pretty pathetic.

So what did he have to lose? They weren't going to win, anyway. Not that he wanted to boost Malik's ego, but he was feeling up for something drastic. Maybe it'd get rid of some of this tension in his chest, which only seemed to be getting stronger as the game went on.

He narrowed his eyes.

He'd accepted.

"_Some have seen others die at the hands of the demon's power."_

Malik smiled, his eyes cold and vindictive. He started to move.

" _Others have had fingers burnt to the bone."_

The others were moving into place. Everyone on Domino's side was shadowing Dalton, in small hopes of stopping another score.

" _You have no fingerprints on three of your fingers." _

There it was; Malik was practically giving him the ball, trying to pass it to his brother, who was behind Yami. Yami knew, of course, that that was the entire point.

He reached for it, feeling that same strange clarity he'd felt yesterday wash over him, drowning out all other figments of cluttering thought from his mind.

"_It's a piece of gold."_

SMACK.

The ball hit his hand and he went for it, somehow keeping Marik at bay as he made his way down to the other side of the court.

"_It shouldn't be ruling my life, or anyone else's."_

"Yami!"

Yami passed it to Jim, who was right in front of him. He tried moving, but just as the ball was about to get stolen from him, he shot it back to Yami, who dodged around Marik and was surprised to see a clear spot right in front of him.

Just a few more steps and he was right next to the hoop, free for a few split seconds of anyone that might try to get it from him.

"_People are worth more than that."_

He jumped.

It went through.

_"Right?"_

Yami slammed back down onto the ground, feeling the shock through his legs. He didn't regain his balance, instead falling over forwards onto his hands and knees, his head reeling in a misty haze of blurred vision and sound.

* * *

"Hey," Anzu said, craning her neck to see, "What's happening?"

"Yami fell over," Yugi said. "He looked like he was about to throw up."

Anzu's eyes widened.

"What?"

Yugi shrugged, and put his head back against the wall.

"That's what I saw."

"Is he all right?" Anzu asked, standing up.

"Don't know," Yugi replied. And personally, Yugi didn't really care, either. It was because of that dolt he'd spent almost his entire evening on homework…

* * *

In the midst of the muttering and whispering that had flared up when Yami had fallen over, Joey noticed Yuki was trying to see through Domino's team that had gathered around him, that worried on her face again.

"…Ya know him, or somethin'?"

Yuki looked to Joey.

"He…he looks familiar, yeah," she said. She then sat back. "I don't know from where, though."

"He used ta got ta Dalton," Joey said, "Maybe that's why."

Yuki nodded.

"Yeah, that's probably it…"

* * *

"Hey, man, are you all right?"

It was Jim. Yami could tell by his voice.

"Yeah," Yami managed to force out, taking a deep breath and looking up. He didn't remember coming down with anything, these past few days; just a severe case of nerves induced by panic.

That didn't cause dizziness, did it?

"Need help?"

Yami pushed himself back into a sitting position, and looked up at them all.

"No," he said, "I'm good."

"You sure?"

That was coach. He couldn't see them all that well…why?

The next thing he knew, he was being helped up by somebody; he really didn't register who. People were muttering in the audience, he could tell.

He felt nauseous.

"You told me that burn looked worse than it was," Coach's voice said.

"It does," Yami said, "I'm fine—"

"Yami, you're about to pass out," Coach interrupted, "Now sit down."

"…What?"

"Until you look better, you're not going back out."

"….oh."

Coach stood there for a moment. Yami had the feeling he was waiting for Yami to defend his right to be out there, trying to save Domino's score from utter embarrassment. But all he did was stare at the floor beyond his shoes.

"Here," Coach said, handing him some water. For the briefest moment, Yami just stared at it.

_"Amir, that looks really bad. We need to take him in."  
"How would we explain this to the doctor?"_

He blinked.

"…Thanks," he managed.

* * *

"Well, he's on the side," Anzu said, sitting back down, "And it looks like he's not going to be getting up for a while. I hope he's all right…"

"When Yami fall over, is not evil's doing," Atemu said, on Yugi's other side. "I say something now, if it is."

"Yeah," Yugi said.

Although he really didn't know which one he was responding to.

* * *

"Man, it's ovah now," Joey said, sitting back. "With Yami out, Domino's screwed."

"I thought you came for both," Honda said.

"Well, yeah, I'm just sayin' dat there's nat much left ta do, unless Domino pulls some kinda magic trick outta their pocket. It's nat nearly as interestin' now."

"What about your friend?" Yuki asked. "Jim, is it?"

Joey let out a laugh.

"Heh. You lookit how your team's doin' out dere an' tell me Jim's good."

Yuki raised an eyebrow.

"You're so supportive."

"Yeah, he'd understand—" Joey said.

"No he wouldn't," Honda interrupted.

"…shyaddup."

Honda laughed a little.

"In that case, I'll tell him."

"Yeah, whatevah," Joey said, giving Honda a shove. Honda turned his attention to the game again, yelling when he and the rest of them deemed it necessary.

"So I'm curious," Joey said, turning to Yuki, "You know any 'a the team personally?"

"…I guess…" Yuki said, after seeming awkward for a moment. "I've heard of them, but I haven't talked to them, or anything."

"Ah."

"Why?"

Joey shrugged.

"Just wonderin'. That's all."

* * *

He wasn't feeling better. He should be feeling better by now. He needed to feel better. He needed to breathe.

What the hell do you cook with oil? It didn't matter now! What mattered was the rest of this game. And then he'd go home, and think about his homework, except that he wouldn't, because he was too freaked out about the curse, because it was such a big thing and now he'd agreed to trying to solve it even though he didn't know where to begin even though he kind of had an idea with that whole thing that Kaiba told him, and the pharaoh, whom Yami was sure was there, even if Mom freaked out about his not saying anything to Yugi about it, and there was Yugi, and that final project in history, which he'd completely forgotten until now, because he was panicking—

Yami shook his head.

_Why_ couldn't he calm down! He just felt…resless…

He leaned over, and put his face in his hands.

Was this stupid game over yet?

_"thanaa…" _(2)

Yami straightened.

"What the hell…?" he muttered, turning around. People watching the game were cheering, or eating. Or giving him a cautious look.

No one that looked like they had a creepy voice they could throw next to Yami's ear, though.

Did that mean something? Was he really that sick? What else would make him hear voices…?

* * *

"Yugi."

Yugi turned; Atemu's voice was urgent, all the sudden.

"The evil…"

"What about it?" Yugi asked, without thinking.

"Huh?"

Yugi jumped, remembering that Anzu was there.

"Oh, um…nothing."

Anzu seemed skeptical, but turned her attention back to the game. Either that, or she was pretending to watch the game, which Yugi was almost sure of. He had a lurking feeling that he couldn't doubt her knowing anything—

"_ah, sal na,_ it is trying to talk to Yami!"

It took all the willpower Yugi had in him not to outwardly react to that statement. Instead, he clenched his fists, and looked for where Yami was sitting…

* * *

Demon. The demon could do that; it could try to talk to him, right?

…Oh, god.

Yami closed his eyes, not even bothering to fight down the wave of nauseous fear that coursed through him now.

"Shit…"

"_themu…"_

"_Stop!"_ Yami hissed, making sure no one else could hear him. Not now…this couldn't be happening now…

He was clutching the water bottle in his hand so tightly his fingers were white, and he knew he wasn't hearing right. His vision was blurring…

"_sene…"_

"Fuck—!"

* * *

"You all right?"

"Huh?" Yugi asked.

She _was_ watching him. Even though she was faced towards the game. Yugi knew that trick.

Dammit…

"Yugi! Where is Yami?" Atemu said, "I cannot find him to help—"

"I—I think I dropped something important down the bleachers," Yugi spat out.

"Eh?" Atemu asked.

"Really?" Anzu said.

"Yeah," Yugi said, getting up, and searching through his pockets, "I don't have my key…_crap_…"

"I could help you look for it, if you want," Anzu offered.

Yugi paused in his fake search.

Did she just offer to help him?

"Yugi!" Atemu snapped.

"N—No, that's fine," Yugi said, giving his head a shake, and starting to make his way down the bleachers.

"You sure?" Anzu called after him.

But he didn't respond.

He wouldn't know how to, anyway.

* * *

Once he had gotten to the bottom and under the bleachers where everyone was sitting, Yugi whipped out his cell phone, and started to make the motions of dialing home.

"Eh, Yugi! Why are you using that! Yami—"

"Hi, it's me," Yugi interrupted, turning to where he felt that strange cold the strongest; under the bleachers it was still light enough to see almost nothing of Atemu, save for an ambiguous wisp of smoky whiteness here or there.

"_Yugi! What are you doing—!_"

"Where did you want me to go again?"

A silence.

"…Where?" Yugi repeated.

Apparently Atemu wasn't getting it. Sighing angrily, Yugi lowered his voice.

"You wanted me to take you to where Yami was, right?"

"Eh? You are talking to me?"

"_Yes!_" Yugi hissed, "You idiot!"

"Ah, I see now! That is smart, Yugi!"

Yugi just rolled his eyes. The genealogy was making itself more and more apparent.

"So tell me where I need to go," he said, "So you can do…whatever you did before."

"Protect Yami?"

"…Yeah."

For a moment, Atemu didn't say anything; Yugi could only assume he was thinking.

"Keep walking in direction you are going now," he said finally.

"Okay…"

* * *

Anzu craned her neck to see where Yami was sitting. She was worried about that burn…especially considering where he'd gotten it from…

And now it was out in the open, for everyone to see. On top of that, this Yugi character she'd finally met seemed to be paying a lot of attention to the empty space right next to him, and had even talked to it before running off.

It had to be that ghost Yami was talking about. She couldn't think of anything else that it could be.

Which left the question of where he had gone. And why. Did it have to do with how strange Yami was acting?

Anzu stood, and walked down a few steps on the bleachers.

She gasped, when she saw Yami. He was holding his head in his hands. He looked panicked.

"Excuse me," she said to the person in front of her, "Sorry, I just need to get through here…sorry…"

* * *

"Do you see him yet?"

"No," Yugi said, "I'm under the bleachers. And it's kind of hard to see through people's feet—"

"Stop!"

Yugi jumped at the sudden urgency of Atemu's voice, jerking upwards—

THUNK.

Yugi ducked down again, holding the top of his head; he'd slammed it into one of the wooden supports.

"_Gah_!"

"—I can sense Yami now," Atemu continued, paying no attention to Yugi, "we are close enough. If we are too close, and I cannot do anything. This is why, I think, last time did not work."

And with that, he took a deep breath, and was silent.

Meanwhile, Yugi felt a very severe headache coming on. And his ribs were starting to hurt again…

"_Dammit Atemu_!" Yugi hissed, "You almost gave me a concussion!"

"Ssh! I must concentrate!"

"So what happens if I black out, genius?" Yugi quipped, "What are you going to do then?"

"I will think of something then! Quiet!"

"Oh, for christ's sake…"

He took another breath, and started saying something in a different language.

After a few moments, though, he stopped.

"Yugi! If I have body right now, I would hit you in different spot! Maybe then you will forget about your head!"

"Oh, just do your chanting shit!" Yugi hissed back.

"That is what I am trying to do!"

"Well do it!"

"You are not letting me!"

"I'm just holding my head! What more do you want!"

"Stop making noise!"

"I'm not making any noise!"

"Then what is this groaning I hear!"

"Groaning? What the hell are you talking about! I'm not doing anything!"

Atemu didn't respond to that.

"…What is it?" Yugi asked, after a moment.

"If it is not you…Yami?"

"Well, he's got plenty to groan about…"

"Wait a minute," Atemu said, "I think…there is something else…"

"Huh?"

"Something else… that is not Yami…"

"…_what?_"

* * *

"You feel that, don't you?"

A nod.

The older man snorted.

"You're not going to win this, you know," he said. "No matter how hard you try, you know you're nothing. Just try. Try to go out there and stop it. Try to resist. I'm sure they'll both be waiting with open arms to welcome you on the other side when you fail—"

"SHUT UP!"

The outburst echoed against the walls.

Glare met glare.

And deep within themselves, they both felt the tension lessen.

* * *

"Ah," Atemu said, in a knowing tone. "I see now."

"What?" Yugi asked, carefully straightening, still holding his head. "What just happened?"

"It is fine," he said, "The evil…is gone from Yami's consciousness, for now."

"It's not trying to talk to him anymore?"

"no."

BZZZZZZZT!

"Gah!" Yugi said, jumping again. "God! Could that buzzer by any louder!"

Suddenly, the crowd on the other side of the court burst out in cheering.

"It must be loud," Atemu said simply, "I hear buzz, faintly."

"I think the game's over…"

* * *

Hold on…

Yami lifted his had out of his hands. He put his hand on his chest.

Nothing.

He felt absolutely nothing, now. Nothing except tired, and sore.

He closed his eyes in relief, and tilted his head back.

"Thank god…" he muttered.

Now he could go home, and hide under the covers of his bed until he felt better. He needed sleep…

He should ask Dad about what he could do about his burn; it was hurting pretty badly…

"You all right?"

Yami opened his eyes. Coach was standing there, along with the rest of the team. He shook his head, and smiled weakly.

"I'm fine, now. Sorry about that…"

Coach shrugged.

"Ah, well," he said, with a shrug, "There's always next time."

"We could use some of their coordination, though," Jim said.

"That we could," Coach agreed. "Well, if we practiced more, I'm sure we could get up to speed soon enough…"

But Yami was shaking his head.

"The only reason why they're like that is because they've been friends since elementary school. They act as one. They hang out with each other, and no one else. And even then, all they talk about is basketball. There's nothing else to their lives. All that happens out here," He indicated the court behind them, "That's all they have."

For a moment, the team stared at Yami. He realized, then, that that was probably the most he had said that entire semester, to them.

He shrugged, and got up.

"Personally, I think it's kind of silly."

And with that, he took his empty water bottle off the bench, and started walking towards the locker room. He needed some regular clothes…

* * *

"That was pretty sweet!" Honda said, getting up and stretching, "I didn't know Jim had it in him to make a break for it like that!"

"Yeah, no kiddin'!" Joey agreed, "Right at the last minute, too! Too bad it didn't do much good, though…"

"Well, they didn't lose as badly," Yuki said, "And that's something."

"Yeah," Joey agreed, "And it was still an awesome way ta end."

"So what were you saying about Jim?" Yuki asked, turning to Joey. "About how bad of a player he was?"

"I didn't say he was bad…I just said he wasn't as good as Dalton!"

"Which means you said he was bad," Honda said.

"I did nat!"

"We believe you," Yuki said, smirking again.

"No ya don't," Joey said. "You're lying."

"And?"

Honda started laughing.

"…Shyaddup…"

* * *

Yugi put his phone back into his pocket. People were starting to leave.

"_Well_," he said, "That was interesting..."

"Do not go yet."

Yugi paused.

"Why not? You said it would come, it did, and now it's gone. We're done."

"It is not that simple," Atemu said heavily.

"…What do you mean?"

"I still feel it is not safe, for Yami."

Yugi let out a short laugh.

"Is it ever?"

"You know what I am meaning."

Yugi thought about it for a moment. He supposed he did. He rolled his eyes. He was going to be _extremely_ glad when this was all over…

"…so what happens now?" he asked.

"We follow Yami," Atemu said. "Without him knowing we are there."

"…_What!" _Yugi exclaimed, somehow making sure in his panic to keep his voice lowered, "I'm not going to go around stalking people!"

"You must trust me, Yugi!" Atemu countered.

He groaned. _God_, his head hurt…

"Fine," Yugi grumbled, "I'm going to get you for this, though…"

"How are you going to 'get me' as you say?" Atemu asked. He sounded amused. "I am spirit."

"Believe me," Yugi said, "With this headache, I'll find something…"

"Do not worry, I will not torture you for long time. Only until I feel safe being far from him."

"Yeah, yeah, I get it…" Yugi muttered, finding his way out from under the bleachers—

…Only to find Anzu standing at the edge of them, looking concerned.

"…Hi," Yugi said, coming out from under the bleachers. He squinted; he'd gotten used to the dark, under there…

"I…I need to talk to you," Anzu said. She seemed a little apprehensive.

Yugi raised an eyebrow. What the hell would she possibly want to talk to him about?

At this, Anzu leaned forward. Yugi noticed that he came up to her shoulder, height-wise.

"…about the ghost," she whispered.

* * *

"Well, I think we made the most noise!" Honda said, pushing open the doors to the outside.

"Yeah!" Brett said, "Mr. Leonard had to tell us to shut up twice!"

Cheering from all of them ensued.

"Woo!"

"Hey, look!" Brett yelled, "It's Jim!"

"Hey! Jimmy!"

They all herded off to where Jim had walked out of another door to the gym, looking somewhat embarrassed.

Joey hung behind, and made sure he had his keys.

"Thanks."

Joey looked up to see Yuki standing next to him, smiling.

"That was fun."

"Oh, uh…yeah," Joey said, feeling that nervousness he'd felt before well up within him. Then he shivered; it was colder than when he'd gotten out of the car to go in…

"No problem."

An awkward silence. Brett could be heard telling Jim about Joey's comment. Although really, Joey didn't care right now; all he was focused on was trying to get his tongue to work properly.

"Um…d'ya wanna hang out sometime?" he spat out.

For a moment, Yuki didn't respond. She just stood there, looking surprised. Then, in a smaller voice she asked,

"…Really?"

"Yeah," Joey said, "You seem like a cool person. Haven't been meeting a lotta those, lately."

Yuki let out a laugh.

"Neither have I," she said.

Joey started fishing around in his pockets.

"'f I had somethin' ta write with, I'd give ya my number, but—"

"Here!"

Joey saw a pen shoved into his face. Yuki was holding it out at arm's length, her expression eager.

"Thanks," Joey laughed, taking it. He then pulled out a piece of paper from his pocket, and wrote his number down.

"There," he said, handing it to her. He was going to say something else, but somehow…he'd forgotten what it was…

"Joey! Unlock the door, I'm freezing my ass off over here!"

Joey blinked, and saw that Honda was waiting at his car, hopping up and down.

"You brought a jacket!" Joey said, "What're _you _complainin' about?"

Nonetheless, though, he pulled his keys out of his pocket.

"I'll, uh…see ya later then?"

"Yeah," Yuki said, folding Joey's number up, and putting it into her purse. "I'll call."

"All right," Joey said, "See ya then. Was good mettin' ya."

"Yeah, you too," Yuki said, as Joey walked to the car.

"All right, stahp jumpin' I'm comin'."

"_Finally_…"

"Quit whinin'," Joey said, unlocking the doors. Then, with one last look at Yuki, he got into the car, turned down the radio he'd left blasting, and drove off.

And Yuki stood a few yards from the gym's entrance, watching silently as Joey's junker of a car drove off into the night, motionless.

The minute she knew they were gone, however, she shot her fist in the air and hopped around, saying,

"Yessssssss! Yes yes yesssssssoooohoohoomy_god_, it's cold out here!"

And with that, she dove back inside the gym, nearly tripping over the threshold in her flat shoes.

"Ack—!"

* * *

A/N: All right, so that was a little different than what I usually end up doing, in terms of chapters…that was interesting.

All 23 pages of it. O.O

And I have to admit, the last time I played basketball on a team was when I was about five, six. Therefore, the terminology might have been a bit sketchy/weird. Feel free to call me on it, or correct something that doesn't seem right to you basketball fans/players out there.

And I apologize for the late delay between my replying to everyone's reviews, and the posting of this chapter; the site was a little buggy this morning, but it seems to be fixed. Just in case you were wondering where this chapter I'd replied to you telling you to have fun reading was. Heh.

Next up: Yami and Bakura talk afterwards (because he _was _at the game, wahaha). Chaos ensues. In more ways than one.

Notes:

(1): paraphrased from the Compact Edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, page 683, copyright 1982.

(2) still the gibberish. Sorry I don't know ancient Egyptian. Although that'd be uber-cool…

I know I cited that wrong, but my Harbrace handbook is locked away somewhere until school starts up again. So there.


	32. Stalking Secrets

A/N: Well.

So much for finishing this over the summer.

Chapter title: Stalking Secrets

* * *

He was done. Domino had lost.

And that was that.

Yami straightened, picked up his gym bag that now had his basketball uniform in it, and walked out of the locker room. Jim tried to say something as Yami shuffled by the rest of the team making their way in, but Yami didn't listen.

Stopping to do so would require an energy he didn't want to pull out of himself.

He wondered if Bakura had been there, after all. Yami cringed at the thought; he knew that the first thing out of Bakura's mouth was going to be about how Yami had acted, during the second half of the game. What the hell would Yami say?

What _could_ he say? What kind of transparent lie was he going to feed his best and oldest friend? And how offended would Bakura get this time? They all sounded the same, after a while…and it wasn't like Bakura didn't know something was up, either.

"_I have a feeling there are a lot darker things behind all this ..."_

That was weeks ago. And ever since then, things had been getting harder and harder to hide. The only reason Bakura hadn't pulled the problem out of him yet, Yami knew, was that Bakura went to a different school and didn't see him that often. Otherwise…

Yami let out a shaky sigh, and pulled his school uniform's jacket more tightly around himself, feeling another wave of nervous nausea. He pushed through the crowd filing out of the gym's doors on the opposite side from where the locker rooms were, and shunted off to the side, removed from the general commotion of people leaving to go home.

It was a slow progression out to the parking lot; most ran into other people they knew, and slowed down to a stop as their greetings evolved into conversation. Kids found classmates to run off with, as parents exchanged small talk. The high school students shuffled off to their own cars—those that were old enough. Younger siblings wandered between their parents, bored.

Yami felt as though he were watching it all through someone else's eyes. That this world in front of him that was so simple and free of worries was one he could only look at. He could never live like this. He'd never have a chance to.

A feeling of inense loneliness came over Yami, as he stood there. Granted, he'd always felt isolated in one way or another, but…he never felt it this intensely.

"_This isn't as hard as you think it is." _

…Maybe he wasn't as alone as he thought. After all, everyone had their secrets to hide. Even the people in front of him, happy as they seemed. Maybe the pointlessness of their current conversations was their saving grace, as they tried to forget what the past had given them.

Yami leaned against the wall behind him, thinking that if Bakura was there, he'd be looking for Yami. His parents didn't know when the game ended; he could talk to Bakura for a little and then head home.

…Besides…he couldn't be the only one in the world that was cursed, right? Maybe someone else out there was trapped by something they couldn't control.

Yami let out a soft laugh.

What was he thinking? Even if there were other people with cursed necklaces out there, they weren't here. They couldn't relate to Yami, or give him advice. They couldn't tell him things weren't as bad as they seemed.

The ghost of the pharaoh said he knew everything he needed to to break the curse—something no one had ever done before. Not anyone in his family or outside of it.

Which meant that from here on, Yami was on his own.

Completely.

Yami closed his eyes, and took a deep breath. He didn't know why, but he felt that something was going to happen soon. He couldn't shove these thoughts away for some other time.

Not anymore.

He had to brace himself for the worst, hold himself to the path he had declared as his own—however harsh it might be. Whatever ended up happening was his responsibility, his fault, and his punishment to take as his own.

Yami found the thought comforting, in a strange way.

After all…no one else would be hurt by Yami's breaking the connection between the necklace and the demon. It might kill Yami, but it wouldn't bring the demon into this world.

…right?…

* * *

Yugi felt everything within him freeze.

So Yami had told her about the ghost. Which meant she knew about the incident that put the burn on Yami's neck, most likely. And even though Yugi was sure that he would have seen that coming, had he had gotten the chance (or urge) to think about it, he was still staring wide-eyed at this girl he barely knew, too blown away to even speak.

He couldn't remember the last time that happened…

Had it ever?

"Eh, Yugi?" Atemu's voice asked next to him. Yugi blinked, and turned to the space where he was floating. "Why are you not moving? We are following Yami, yes? Where is he now?"

"It's been following you, I know," Anzu said, in a lowered voice. Yugi looked back to her. She was looking directly at him, her stare penetrating. "And I know it was the reason why you left to crawl around under the bleachers when Yami was panicking during the game, just now. Does that have something to do with how Yami seemed better suddenly?"

Yugi said nothing. Nothing came to mind. No matter what the pharaoh said to get his attention ("Yami! We follow Yami now! _Yugi_!"), he stayed where he was, holding the same breath he had taken in when she'd approached him.

Anzu looked down.

"I—I know it's awkward that I know about this," she said in a lowered voice, "but after seeing Yami's burn in class, I asked how it got there. And he…told me."

Despite himself, Yugi let out a short laugh. Guess Yami couldn't keep it to himself, after all.

"What?" Anzu asked.

Yugi shook his head.

"Nothing," he replied, his voice distant.

And as he stood there trying to pull thoughts through his numbed mind, Yugi realized that, given the situation, Anzu was actually being very smart about it. She had waited until she could talk to Yugi out of earshot of anyone else around, and didn't mess around with talk that didn't have to do with anything. Three sentences, and Yugi knew everything she wanted him to know.

And that made Yugi feel somewhat better; at least he didn't have a complete idiot on his hands, right?

It was hard enough trying to deal with one…

"Yugi! _Go_! Yami is getting far—"

Yugi's head snapped in the direction of the pharaoh, and he hissed,

"Ssh!"

Anzu jumped, seeming startled.

"What noise is that?" Atemu snapped, glaring at Yugi, "We follow Yami—!"

"I don't know what made Yami stop panicking," Yugi interrupted, turning to Anzu, "But he does."

And he gave a nod in the pharaoh's direction. Anzu looked over, but (of course) saw nothing.

After a strained moment, Atemu exclaimed,

"Ah! You are talking to someone about Yami and about me! That is why you are not going! I understand now."

Yugi gave the pharaoh a strange look.

"He's here? now?" Anzu asked.

Yugi nodded.

Then, before either of them could say anything else,

"WHAT?!"

Yugi jumped.

"Yugi!" Atemu shouted, "_Who are you telling about me?!_ Why are they knowing about this?! Do not waste time explaining to people about me, you can do later! Stop standing here—"

"I haven't told her anything!" Yugi hissed, "That was Yami's doing!"

Atemu (from what Yugi could see of him), froze, eyes widened.

"…Yami?"

"Yes, Yami!" Yugi said, "Someone in his class saw the burn he got when you tried to talk to him, and Yami told her how it got there. So if you're going to have a cow about it, go talk to Yami!"

"If I can go to him I do!" Atemu snapped, "But I cannot go back to him now! This is why I want you to follow! Do not be stupid!"

Yugi rolled his eyes. Anzu seemed unsure of whether to be confused or outright scared. Noticing this, Yugi explained,

"For some reason, the ph—the ghost can only see me. It can't see anything around me, or anyone around me. Which means that in order for him to keep an eye on Yami until he goes home, _I_ have to keep an eye on him."

Anzu frowned.

"So…you basically have to stalk him?"

Yugi blinked.

He hadn't thought of it like that…made perfect sense, though.

"…Yes," he said, "I'm…stalking."

And if that mental connection wasn't strange enough, what came out of Anzu next was even more so;

"…Would it be all right if I came along?"

For a moment, Yugi wasn't sure he had heard right. What kind of person _was_ this girl? First she pops out of nowhere to ask Yugi about a ghost, then she asks if she can follow him in his schizophrenic adventures through a school that was fast becoming empty. Not to mention the fact that one didn't run into people being haunted by ghosts only they could see every day.

But for some reason, she didn't seem to think that it was strange only Yugi could see the pharaoh. She just took the fact as it was.

And that right there was enough to convince Yugi to do what he did next.

He turned, and started walking out of the gym.

"If Yami sees you," he said, "you're on your own."

* * *

"Yamiyamiyamiyamiyami!"

Yami blinked, and looked to where the source of high-pitched squeakiness was coming from.

And what he saw was enough to cause Yami to abandon all previous thoughts or foundations thereof completely.

"Whoa…"

A small-chested girl in a tight purple t-shirt and a short denim skirt came bounding over to stop in front of him, a look of utter excitement on her face. Her white hair was straightened and styled, and Yami was sure he could see some kind of sparkly something on her face.

For a moment, the only thing Yami could do in his utter shock was stare at her. Then, he managed to force out:

"…_Bakura_?!"

Bakura giggled in a way Yami never thought could be drawn from a male voice box, and exclaimed,

"You'll _never_ guess what just happened!"

"You're…glittery…"

"Oh, never mind that!" Bakura said, grabbing Yami's arm and dragging him down the hallway, away from the crowd.

"Gah—!"

"I've got something important to tell you!"

"All right, I'm coming! Geez!" Yami said, still shocked by Bakura's attire. He had certainly paid attention to the details…

"Where did you get that purse?"

"Oh, that didn't sound flaming at _all_, Yami."

"I didn't mean it like that!" Yami said, yanking his arm away from Bakura's grip, "I was just wondering how you managed to shop for that in an actual _store_—"

"I want to tell you everything! But we need to hide, because I don't want people listening in—"

"How the hell did you manage to get a bra?!" Yami hissed, lowering his voice, "And there's something _in_ it!"

"It's called padding, you idiot!" Bakura hissed back, "And stop gawking! It's not like you haven't seen me in one of these already!"

"That was three years ago!" Yami countered, "I thought you thought they were too hard to get on!"

"So I gave them a second chance! But that's not what I wanted to tell you!"

With that, Bakura yanked Yami around the corner.

"Gah—!" Yami managed, as he was shoved against the concrete wall of the hallway leading to the rest of the school.

"Ow!"

Bakura ignored Yami's complaints. Looking both ways to make sure no one else was within earshot, he exclaimed in a lowered voice,

"Joey asked me out!" 

Yami froze, wide-eyed.

"Yami?" Bakura asked, after a moment. He waved a hand in front of Yami's face.

"Yamiiiiii…_Yami!_" he snapped, hitting Yami upside the had.

"What the…_WHAT_?!"

Bakura blinked.

"Geez, I didn't hit you that badly—"

"No!" Yami said, "Your—your date thing! _Who_ asked you out?!"

"Joey!" Bakura exclaimed. "Isn't that funny?"

"…_Holy shit_, Bakura! How did you pull that off?!"

"LOOK AT ME!" Bakura yelled. He then laughed, "Oh, my god, it was _great_, Yami!"

Yami, meanwhile, had a hand to his forehead.

"You know," he said, after a moment, "This is _not_ what I was thinking of when I said you could mess with his mind…"

"But it was fun!"

"But you have a date with him!" Yami exclaimed, "_A date_! Please don't tell me he gave you his number."

"_Duh_! That's what happens when two people want to set up a date!"

Yami put his face in his hands.

"Oh, my _god_…"

"Oh, lighten up!" Bakura laughed, giving Yami a pat on the shoulder, "I'll tell him eventually."

"_Eventually_?! What exactly are you planning on doing to him?!"

Bakura just cackled at that.

"Wouldn't you like to know?"

"Oh, my—No, I don't actually, thank you," Yami said, shaking his head, "Oh, god, I would rather _not_ have those images in my head—!"

"Hey, Yami," came a deeper voice.

Bakura and Yami both looked over to see Malik at the end of the hallway they had turned down, arms crossed.

And for the second time in the span of about ten minutes, Yami felt as though his brain were about to explode. As if Bakura wasn't enough…now Malik had to pick something with him! He'd lost! Handed Domino's team to him on a silver platter! What more did Malik want?! Not that Yami was about to ask him straight out; Malik's temper was known for being very, very short. Much worse than Yami could ever claim for himself, even at his worst.

And so, he composed himself, taking a deep breath and sticking together what wits he had left about him.

"Hello, Malik."

"How're things going?" Malik shot. It wasn't a friendly inquiry.

Yami shrugged.

"Could be better, could be worse."

"Ah," Malik said. His eyes flipped to Bakura, who had taken a step towards Yami. It was only for the briefest of moments, however, before they flicked back to Yami again.

"You were really good out there," he said, curtly to the court, "Guess I should have come out during lunch more often, freshman year."

If it had been anyone else, it would have been meant as a good-natured comment. But there was no laughter in Malik's eyes, and Yami knew that there wouldn't be anytime during this conversation.

Yami shrugged again. It was the only thing he could think of doing. Well—aside from wishing himself out of existence.

"You were out there a lot of the time," he managed to say—an nice, neutral statement.

Malik nodded slightly.

"Not as often as you and your friend," he said, eyes flicking quickly over to Bakura again. "You made people wonder if you got hooked up."

And before Yami could even open his mouth to reply, Bakura had wrapped his arm around Yami's, and was saying,

"As a matter of fact, that's exactly what happened."

Yami had to use every ounce of what little energy he had left to keep from flipping out. He was pretty sure his expression turned funny, though, judging from how Malik gave him a strange look for a moment, before turning to Bakura, whom he was forced to acknowledge was there.

"Really?" Malik asked flatly, clearly not believing him.

"Oh," Bakura said casually, "We've been off and on for about six months. Six months being the on time."

At this, Malik's eyes narrowed.

"Six?" he repeated. Yami noticed his tone had suddenly gotten dangerous.

Shitshitshitshitshit!!!

"Yes," Bakura continued, "Six. I'm glad you ended it when you did; Yami and I were just picking up again."

Malik stood there for a moment, taking in Yami's blank look, and Bakura's expression of icy anger.

"You slut," he spat at Bakura, before turning at walking away.

Once Yami was absolutely sure Malik was out of earshot and sight, he exhaled the lungful of air he had been keeping in, grabbing onto Bakura's shoulder to keep from falling over. His limbs felt very watery.

"Bakura!" he gasped, taking his friend by the shoulders and shaking him vigorously, "I am going to kill you! Do you hear me?! KILL!"

"Look," Bakura explained calmly, disentangling himself, "You go to a different school, I wanted to piss him off, and I couldn't think of anything else."

"You wanted to piss him off?!" Yami hissed, "And why the hell did you do it by getting him to think you were a slut?!"

"Ssh!" Bakura snapped, lowering his voice, "Of course he doesn't think I'm a slut! He just said that because he has nothing better to say."

"Bakura! This is Malik we're talking about! I don't know what you were thinking, dating him in the first place, but for god's sake! He's going to be after my life!"

"Oh, calm down," Bakura said, with a wave of his hand, "He's just all brawn and no brains."

"Brains don't matter when it comes to brawn!" Yami blithered.

Bakura rolled his eyes, and took Yami by the hand.

"Come on dear," he said, leading Yami towards the gym's exit, "you need some fresh air before you have a stroke, or something."

"Get your hands off me!"

But Bakura just shook his head, and laughed.

"You know, Yami, you really don't give yourself enough credit," he said, as he found a door.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that you could beat up Malik."

"Malik is not my problem," Yami replied irritably, following Bakura out one of the doors to the outside, "Therefore, I will do no such thing."

"Well," Bakura said, "If he does come after you, you can fight him and have a chance of winning."

"If he comes to me wanting to fight," Yami declared, "I'm going to tell him the truth."

"Fine," Bakura said, repressing a shiver, "But I know he won't. He doesn't know where you live, and there's no way Domino's going to be seeing Dalton play again this year."

"And how are you so sure?"

"Your loss put you out of the running for the regionals," Bakura stated.

Yami blinked.

"…oh."

"Anyway," Bakura said, looking Yami in the eye, "Thanks for playing along. Seriously."

Yami rolled his eyes, and crossed his arms in an effort to keep body heat in.

"I looked like I was scared shitless…"

Bakura shrugged.

"It added to the effect. He knows you get embarrassed about that kind of thing. And you shouldn't be scared of him. Like I said before, no brains and all brawn."

"You still didn't have to get me involved."

"Yami," Bakura said, putting and arm around Yami's shoulders, "You know very well the only way you'll ever get out of being my fake boyfriend."

"Oh, so now I have a title?"

"That's not the point."

"It still sounds stupid—"

"The only way you'll get out of being my fake boyfriend," Bakura interrupted, "is if someone else takes my place."

Yami pulled away, giving Bakura an even more strange look.

"…I'd have to become someone else's fake boyfriend?! What the—?!"

"NO!" Bakura snapped, hitting Yami on the arm, "Real boyfriend, you idiot!"

"…oh."

Then, Yami shook his head.

"Whatever," he said, "Just…don't make a habit of it, all right? I've got enough on my plate as it is."

"Ah, yes," Bakura said, "Kaiba."

Yami gave Bakura a strange look.

"Where did Kaiba come from? And what's that supposed to mean?"

"Oh, nothing," Bakura replied quickly.

"Right…" Yami said flatly. "And you're not flaming."

"Thanks."

"Anytime."

Without really agreeing on it, the both of them started to walk together down the concrete sidewalk that made for a shortcut to the soccer field, strolling as leisurely as they could in the freezing evening air.

"I still can't believe you asked him about that, though."

"What, about the 'let him miss me' thing?"

"Yeah."

"Did I tell you what he said back?"

"No, Bakura said, "we never got that far 'cause I had to leave."

Yami took a deep breath.

"_Well_…"

And he proceeded to tell him what he could of the episode. Which boiled down to Kaiba's reaction to Yami's question, and nothing else. At the end of it, Bakura raised his eyebrows.

"Well, _that _makes perfect sense," he said, the sarcasm in his voice evident.

"I know," Yami replied, "I've been trying to figure out what it might mean. 'something you may never know'…" He repeated. Then he shook his head.

"I'm still stuck at the fact that he actually talked to you about it. He didn't just insult you until you went away."

"Well…" Yami said, "He kind of did both, really."

Bakura stopped walking; a habit Yami had picked up from him when he was surprised, or confused about something.

"…How do you do both?!"

Yami stopped alongside him, and shrugged.

"He managed it. Made him look schizophrenic, though."

Bakura let out a laugh.

"Maybe he is. Maybe one personality wants to be your friend."

"…right. And the other one wants to stab me in my sleep?"

"Hey, it happens…"

Yami laughed, and started walking again.

"Whatever it is," he said, "he doesn't want me to know about it."

"Yeah, really," Bakura agreed, catching up. "But if you think about it, it kind of makes sense."

"How?" Yami asked, cringing inwardly as a gust of wind blew their way.

"Well, if you just look at what he said, that whole 'let him' thing could be translated as 'yes, we fought, but I don't want you to completely forget about me.'" He frowned. "…Maybe his walking out partially had to do with you..."

Yami let out a very loud, derisive laugh.

"Yeah, he just quit going to school because he didn't like me anymore," he said. "_That's_ believable."

"Hey, you're the only friend he had," Bakura pointed out. "Maybe he didn't want to forget the one person willing to carry on a normal conversation with him."

But Yami was shaking his head.

"It still doesn't explain why he decided to leave in the first place," he said, "Besides, I only became his friend because he started talking to me on the first day of school, and I didn't want to be rude."

"Right," Bakura said flatly.

"What?" Yami asked, "It's true!"

"So you were just being polite when you stood up for him?"

Yami didn't say anything to that.

"_Aha_!" Bakura said triumphantly, elbowing Yami in the side, "You'd forgotten about that, hadn't you?"

"…shut up," Yami said, "That was _before_ I knew he was an asshole."

"It was still a sight!" Bakura continued, "In front of the entire school, you told the scariest bully Dalton has seen in years to 'fuck himself before you ripped his throat out' because he was picking a fight with Kaiba. Remember that?"

"Yes, yes, I remember," Yami replied grudgingly. "I wish I didn't, though…"

"Well, you still did it," Bakura said, laughing, "The look on his face!"

And despite himself, Yami smiled slightly.

"Yeah, he looked pretty surprised…"

"Yami, I doubt we will ever see that kind of surprised on him again for as long as we live."

"I doubt we'll see much of him at all," Yami said.

"Hopefully, anyway," Bakura agreed.

A particularly strong gust of wind blew their way.

"_Damn_, it's cold out here!"

"You've got long pants on!" Bakura snapped, "I've got a skirt!"

"We could go back in, you know."

Bakura shook his head.

"No, I like it out here."

Yami gave his friend a strange look.

"You're insane."

"So are you! You're out here with me!"

"That's besides the point."

"All right, fine, I'm Frigophilic."

"A what?"

"It's a smarty-pants way of saying I enjoy freezing my ass off."

"ah."

A silence. Yami stared at the concrete before him as they walked, thinking…

He could shed light on this whole Kaiba thing if he just told Bakura the rest of the conversation. But that'd mean telling him about the curse. And the real reason why Yami talked to Kaiba in the first place.

Yami wondered sometimes why Bakura was even still friends with him, for all the times he'd called Yami on lying to him.

Although Yami had a feeling Bakura wouldn't take it too well, if he suddenly started spewing stories about demons and curses and such.

Bakura wouldn't think he was serious.

…Would he?

Out of the corner of his eye, Yami noticed Bakura looking at him. Yami turned.

"What?"

"You're brooding." Bakura replied. "Spill."

Yami's pace slowed to a stop, as he felt that strange sense of numbness he'd felt right after the game wash over him again.

"_You're confining yourself more than the demon ever could."_

…Was it really just him?

Then, without really thinking about it at all, Yami had taken a breath and was talking.

"I know this is completely random, but…You ever wonder if there's such a thing as a curse?"

"Yeah," Bakura replied flatly, "it's called life."

Yami laughed—albeit a little nervously.

"No, but seriously…you know how there's movies about how people find some kind of thing that's cursed, and they end up getting it?"

"Oh," Bakura said, "You mean like ghost the stories about archaeologists dying because they moved someone's treasures from their tomb, or whatever?"

"Yeah," Yami said, "Like…Like that. What if…"

"That were actually true?" Bakura finished.

"Yeah."

Bakura contemplate the thought for a moment. Then,

"That'd be kinda cool…"

Yami raised an eyebrow. Maybe it was just that he was trying to lead this conversation into a serious direction, but the comment did not seem funny to him at all.

"How would that be cool?"

"Revenge, of course," Bakura replied lightly, "think of all the people you could make miserable!" He laughed.

"You could get some kind of cursed jewelry, give it to them for their birthday…have them never be able to get it off…"

Yami was silent.

Why did he even start to talk?

"Yami?"

"Huh?" Yami said absently, gluing his eyes on what was directly ahead of him—which, strangely enough, happened to be the one-sided willow, partially hidden behind the bushes surrounding the track.

"You all right?"

"Yeah, yeah…I'm fine."

"You sure?"

Yami nodded silently, doing nothing to break the awkward silence that followed.

* * *

Behind the thicker part of the bushes surrounding the track, Yugi shook his head. He'd heard Yami talk about this Bakura character in class. And gathering from the phrases such as 'boy drama', he guessed the guy was a little strange.

But the person walking around the track was just freakish.

Asking Joey out on a date, posed as a girl? And while Yugi was certainly the last person that would feel compelled to shed some compassion for Joey, he couldn't help but thinking what, exactly, he was in for.

And what was this about Yami standing up for Kaiba? 'Before he knew he was an asshole'…

"What is happening now, Yugi?"

"They're walking," Yugi whispered as quietly as he could over the shoulder that felt coldest.

What he didn't realize was that it was the same one that was closest to Anzu.

"What?" she whispered back.

"Ghost," Yugi replied.

"oh."

"What is ghost?" Atemu asked.

Yugi rolled his eyes.

"Do you want to keep an eye on Yami or not?"

"Yes—"

"Then _ssh_!"

The pharaoh didn't respond to that.

* * *

"Yami, let me ask you something."

"Yeah?" Yami asked, not meeting Bakura's eyes.

"Is this about that thing you can never tell me about?"

"…yeah," Yami forced out quietly, "It…it does."

"You sound stressed."

"Stress doesn't even begin to cover it, believe me," Yami said, with a mirthless laugh.

"…So what's wrong?"

"It's…"

For a long moment they stood there, waiting for that one moment Yami was always afraid would come.

Now, here it was. And Yami couldn't find the courage to even begin talking.

"…Does this have to do with Kaiba?" Bakura asked warily.

Slowly, Yami's hand subconsciously wrapped itself around the pyramid of the necklace.

"No," Yami said, "Not completely, anyway…"

"So it has to do with him _partially_?"

Yami's hand holding the necklace clenched.

"Look," Yami said, "that's not the whole—"

"Well then what _is_ the whole story?" Bakura snapped. Yami looked up, and was startled by the intense worry that had suddenly surfaced on Bakura's face.

"You've only been telling me half of it for a long time now!" He said, his voice rising in volume, "And what you _have_ told me is enough to make me wonder if you're going to end up killed because you went too far!"

And even though Yami knew that Bakura didn't know anything about the necklace—how _could _he know?—the irrational part of his mind found that comment a little too close for comfort.

"If I told you what my problem is, you wouldn't believe me!" Yami yelled back, more out of fear than an actual intention of saying what he was, "You would think I was spewing shit just to get you off my back!"

"Well it wouldn't be any different than what you've _been _doing! Don't think I don't know you've been making up excuses!"

"Look—he…it'll take a long time to explain—"

"Oh, I haven't heard THAT before—"

"_I'M TRYING_!"

Bakura fell silent. He was glaring.

Shit.

"I'm trying to tell you, all right?!" Yami tried to explain, "It's not easy! This is…it's so big..."

"Death, Yami!" Bakura interrupted, "He threatened _death_! That isn't something you take lightly!"

"_You think I have been?!_" Yami shouted, anger shooting through him, "What do you think I did to him after I found that out?! I beat the shit out of him!"

"Oh, that's a great way to solve things! Just beat each other up and call it fair!"

"That's not—!"

But Bakura was already walking away.

"Bakura!" 

Yami tried to go after him as he headed back down the pathway, but something stopped him—a strange, heavy tension that seized his lungs, choking all the air out of his body. The change was so sudden that it caught Yami by surprise, causing him to fall over his own feet. And before he even hit the frozen pavement, Yami could feel the same waves of acrid fear and nausea that had seized him halfway through the game return tenfold, and everything started to spin around him.

He hit hard; he could feel his skin scrape against the rough ground, and his entire body felt the shock as though he had fallen from three stories instead of just a couple feet. He rolled over from the momentum of the fall, ending up flat on his back, staring directly at one of the few lights on the school's outside that had been left on. He grimaced, and tried to lift his arm to shield his eyes—

Only to find that his hands were both clenched around his necklace, gripping it so strongly that his knuckles were white, and aching. He realized he was bleeding.

He saw Bakura's silhouette over him. He seemed to be saying something, but Yami couldn't figure out what. Maybe he wasn't saying anything at all; maybe he was just staring at him, wondering why he even knew Yami in the first place. What possessed him to become friends with someone with this kind of burden on their shoulders?

The light behind Bakura was making his vision blurry…suddenly his outline wasn't as discernable as it was…

The heaviness became more intense; Yami could feel his lungs contracting, trying to get air. Whether they were succeeding or not, he didn't know.

He couldn't feel them anymore.

Yami blinked again; Bakura was shaking him. But Yami only knew this because he saw through his hazy vision that Bakura's hands were on his shoulders. He couldn't see Bakura's face.

He could barely see anything…

The blackness that had started at the corners of his eyes crept inwards. Yami tried to blink it away, but they didn't move. He just wasn't responding to himself, anymore.

Dimly, Yami wondered if he was dying.

But the curse…that couldn't happen yet…

What else could this be, though? Why did he feel like he was letting go? And why did he feel so calm?

Where was he going?

In his fading awareness, Yami felt something stronger than he could ever claim to be rushing past him in a blur of icy blue-gray, burning with passionate desire.

That couldn't be…

Could it…?

His vision faded completely.

"YAMI!"

* * *

A/N: All right, so that was a strange mixture of impending global doom and sugar-induced hilarity…

Then again, what else do you expect when Bakura makes an appearance:D

Note: What is about to happen next should not, under any circumstances, be tried at home. If you wish to attempt to break an ancient curse, please consult your ominous engraving/corresponding ancient scripts before attempting to do so. Handle with caution, and only under strict adult supervision.

Oops, did I give away what was going to happen next? I do apologize.

….Wahaha.


	33. The Demon

A/N: Hey, everyone.

…It's been a while, hasn't it?

Chapter Thirty-Two: The Demon

* * *

"_You feel that, don't you?"_

_A nod._

_The older man snorted._

"_You're not going to win this, you know," he said. "No matter how hard you try, you know you're nothing. Just try. Try to go out there and stop it. Try to resist. I'm sure they'll both be waiting with open arms to welcome you on the other side when you fail—"_

"_SHUT UP!"_

* * *

Kaiba's clenched fists started to shake. He hadn't given in like that in almost three years. He hadn't raised his voice that loud, yelled that vehemently, nor wanted this badly to resort to violence since he was at Dalton.

Across the dinner table Gozaburo was motionless, his glare full of a hate Kaiba would like to think wasn't his own. Not that it mattered, now…

In one slow, deliberate motion, Kaiba pushed his plate of untouched food away and stood up.

Gozaburo's expression darkened even more.

"Where are you going?"

It was more of a dare than a question—one that Kaiba didn't care to answer. He turned, and walked out of the dining room.

"_I asked you something!_" his uncle's voice spat.

It would be pointless to respond. Provoking his uncle would only cause the both of them to regress.

"_Seto!"_

Kaiba's pace quickened. He took the stairs to the second floor, and started down the narrow hallway where the bedrooms were.

"GET BACK HERE!" Gozaburo yelled.

His voice didn't sound angry anymore; the tone Kaiba had gotten to used to ignoring for the past three years had been replaced by something Kaiba knew his uncle would never in his long forgotten right mind reduce himself to:

Desperation.

Something was happening.

Heavy footfalls started up the stairs behind him. Kaiba walked into his room, leaving the door open; since his uncle was following him, he may as well see…

Gozaburo stormed down the hallway, shoving Kaiba's bedroom door the rest of the way open.

"You _brat_!" he hissed, "You—"

"You know what we felt," Kaiba interrupted, calmly, opening the top drawer to his desk. Slowly, he pulled out the object he'd taken from his father's office.

He'd put it in his room for safekeeping, as he'd had a feeling that it would come to this. Whether it was just intuition or a product of reasoning Kaiba hadn't been conscious of, he didn't know.

Whatever it was, he was thankful for it now.

He held it out for his uncle to see, just so he could be absolutely sure that Kaiba wasn't playing some kind of trick on him.

"But that's not a reason to give in," Kaiba said quietly.

Instantly, every trace of apoplectic anger vanished from Gozaburo's face. His eyes widened, and his skin was drained what little color it had left as he stared at his seventeen-year-old nephew as though he'd suddenly turned into a monster. He looked genuinely frightened.

"Th—that's—!" he stammered.

"Even you should realize somewhere in that pathetic excuse for a mind," Kaiba interrupted smoothly, lowering his arm, "that you paid dearly for ignoring what we all were responsible for."

His uncle was trying to say something, but it was getting gummed up in his throat, making him look like a suffocating fish.

"My father may have been completely wrong about what he thought," Kaiba continued, his voice unnaturally even, "But I'd rather find that out than live with the knowledge that I didn't even try to validate it."

And in the stifling silence that followed, Kaiba walked past his stunned uncle and headed down the hallway. But before he reached stairwell on the other side, his uncle seemed to gain back enough of his wits to shout after him,

"You only want to believe his garbage _because you didn't when he was alive_!"

Kaiba halted.

"Hah!" Gozaburo shouted triumphantly, "Always has to be a reason with you, doesn't there? He can't have just driven too fast on a wet road! NO! _He_ had to have been killed by a three-thousand-year-old curse!"

Kaiba stared at the stairwell ahead of him, silent. _Resist..._

_"What a joke!"_ his uncle's voice drawled, "It wouldn't have made any difference in the end! How will you fight it, anyway? Where would you go? There _is_ nowhere to go--HEY!"

Kaiba had started walking down the stairs again, very deliberately. When he reached the bottom, he turned and headed towards the door.

He heard his uncle thumping down the stairs after him, as fast as his worn, fat body could carry him, yelling,

_"Are you listening to me?!"_

"No," Kaiba replied shortly, yanking his coat out of the coat closet so forcefully that the hangers smacked against the back wall, "I'm leaving."

And with that, Kaiba put his thickest overcoat on as quickly as he could, shoved the item from his father's office into one of the inside pockets and opened the door, letting a gust of icy cold air into the house. He turned to Uncle Gozaburo, who was shaking. Whether it was anger or something else, Kaiba couldn't tell.

"Don't follow me."

"Where the _hell_ do you think you're going—!"

SLAM.

Four times the sound echoed in the high ceiling above Gozaburo, before it died down to absolute silence.

* * *

"Death, Yami! He threatened _death_! That isn't something you take lightly!"

"_You think I have been?!_ What do you think I did to him after I found that out?! I beat the shit out of him!"

"Oh, that's a great way to solve things! Just beat each other up and call it fair!"

"That's not--! _Bakura!_"

Anzu and Yugi watched the scene from a distance, still crouched behind the bushes between the track and the side of the school. Yugi was confused; what death threat was he talking about?

Kaiba had threatened to _kill_ Yami? Was this before or after Yami had stood up for him? Just what kind of history did those two have?

It almost sounded as crazy as Bakura's personality…

"So something _has_ happened," the pharaoh said heavily. "This is what I am afraid of, before game."

"What?" Yugi whispered, turning to the translucent figure of the pharaoh, "What's going on now?"

Atemu nodded slowly towards where Yami stood.

"We watch."

* * *

The school.

He needed to get to the school.

Kaiba broke into a run, extremely confused; he didn't feel like he was acting on his own, anymore—like someone else had taken hold of his will and was nudging it in its own direction…the thing that he'd gotten from his father's office started to weigh on his coat, making him feel lopsided.

He still didn't know what it was. He always thought it resembled a staff, of some strange sort—a spherical top with wings sticking out the sides, and a long handle attached to the base. It wasn't fancy; the only detail carved into it was that of an eye on one of the sides of the sphere.

He knew his father had looked into what it was, and he had found a lot—but Kaiba had never bothered to ask, when he was alive. He was never really that interested…and all he remembered now was that his father was sure it had belonged to their ancestor, the priest, originally—

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that the staff was now glowing in his pocket.

…

He ran faster.

* * *

"Yami?"

Yami fell with a dull thud, and rolled onto his back. Beside Yugi, Anzu motioned to stand.

"He's holding the necklace…" she whispered, keeping her eyes on Yami and Bakura, "What does that mean?"

Yugi felt his insides turn cold; this was looking a little too familiar…

"Yami!" Bakura snapped, kneeling next to his friend, "Oh, my god—Yami, can you hear me?"

"It means something really, _really _bad is about to happen," Yugi said, "something to do with a ghost and an evil that's he's close to."

"You mean the…the demon?" Anzu whispered, eyes widening.

Yugi turned to Anzu.

"Yami told you abou that—?"

On Yugi's other side, Atemu gasped.

"Someone say his name, he hears it—!"

"Yami! Can you hear me?!" Bakura was saying, "Just—just nod, o-or something—!"

"It is coming," Atemu said, "It cannot stay inside any longer. It is coming out…"

Yugi gawked at the pharaoh.

"_Here_?!" Yugi managed to croak out, "_To Domino?!"_

"No no no! stay with me!" Bakura was yelling, becoming more panicked by the second, "Don't pass out—Yami?….Yami! _Shit—!"_

"What did the ghost say?" Anzu asked, sounding urgent.

"The evil's about to…come out of the necklace…" Yugi said faintly.

"It will not stay inside!" The pharaoh whispered, "_It will not stay inside_!"

"Come on, Yami," Bakura said, his voice wavering, "Wake up!"

"What's going to happen to Yami?" Anzu asked, worried.

"Atemu," Yugi said, relaying the question, "what's going to happen to Yami—Atemu!"

The ghost looked as if it had been stabbed; he was clutching his sides, eyes wide, gasping for breath.

"WAKE UP!_ YAMI!_" Bakura shouted.

Anzu sprung up and ran to where Bakura knelt.

The pharaoh started to fade.

"_Wait!_ Atemu, where are you going—?"

But before Yugi could even think to discern what could have caused the ghost to disappear, he had to shield his eyes from the bright, golden light that suddenly enveloped the edge of the track.

"Agh—!"

* * *

Kaiba almost lost his balance as he blasted around the corner of the school. The staff was getting hot, now, and it was shaking in his pocket—

A bright light obliterated his vision, and he stumbled to a halt.

"What the—?"

Loud roaring sounded in his ears, and a strong wind suddenly picked up out of nowhere, blowing up loose dirt and grass off the field. Kaiba shielded his eyes, trying to keep them open to see what was going on…the ground shook violently and the light started to fade again, making everything seem pitch black in comparison. Blinded, Kaiba staggered—

"KAIBA!"

His head snapped in the direction of the voice—and what met his eyes was a sight he'd never forget.

It was twice the size of his head, glistening and wide, pulling him into cerulean depths so vast and void that it chilled his very soul to stare back. He didn't know how long it stayed directly in front of him; time itself seemed to freeze, drawing out the deep-seated fear it induced in Kaiba to the magnitude of eons of misery.

And in that same span of time, he finally understood why everything that evening had happened the way it did...

* * *

When Yugi put his arm down again, the first thing he saw was a set of massive, white wedges of something digging into the ground near him…And then he realized they were connected to make a hind foot, covered in a shell made of armor-like plates…which was connected to a thick body that stretched the length of the track, tapering down to a whip-like tail…it looked like a dragon; a large, bluish-white dragon, so bright in contrast with the night that it seemed to emanate a light of its own…

This had to be the demon.

For a moment Yugi just stared at it, stunned; he didn't get the feeling that this was supposed to happen…

Something moved in the corner of his eye. Yugi looked over, and realized that the demon was lifting its front foot above its shoulder, readying to strike, its bright claws glistening in the glow of the street lights.

Uh-oh.

Yugi looked down the track to where the demon's head was, and saw that there was someone standing on the sidewalk next to the track. He was lowering his arm from his face and staggering a little, squinting. From the light the demon's eye cast on his profile, Yugi recognized him instantly—and without giving it a second thought, he yelled,

"KAIBA! LOOK OUT!"

Kaiba's head snapped up and he froze, transfixed, staring at the demon's eye. But that only lasted for the few seconds it took for the demon's massive claws to whip downwards and smack into Kaiba's side, sending him flying down the track. He landed hard, rolling to a stop near where Yugi was. Yugi would have thought him unconscious, if he hadn't sprung up again only milliseconds later, eyes wide, clutching a strange golden staff in one hand. He glanced over at Yugi, who had stood up in his outburst.

"Thanks," he rasped.

Yugi nodded silently, startled at Kaiba's appearance; he didn't remember him being at the game—

They heard a scream.

The Demon had twisted around to face Anzu and Bakura, and was staring them down the same way it had with Kaiba—only this time, a low rumble that sounded like thunder was coming from its throat.

Yugi didn't know how he managed to come up with the idea without realizing it; all he knew was that the last thing he wanted to see was people getting ripped apart in front of him. And so, he suddenly found himself yelling at the top of his voice,

"HEY! DEMON!"

The moment the words left his mouth, the demon's head snapped in Yugi's direction, reminding him of a snake.

"How the _hell _does it understand you?!" Kaiba hissed, as the demon shifted its body in their direction.

"It can hear you every time you mention it," Yugi said, scrambling out from behind the bushes, "it was doing that when it was still inside Yami."

It growled again; Yugi could feel the vibrations of the sound resonating in his own chest. He started backing up. _Crap…_

"You mean inside the necklace?"

Despite himself, Yugi turned to look at Kaiba.

"What—"

He started coughing; a horrible, rank smell filled the air, making his eyes water.

"Run," Kaiba commanded.

Yugi looked up—and saw a set of sharp, yellowed teeth, each at least as tall as him.

"NOW!"

Yugi bolted, shooting down the track faster than he'd ever run in his life. He felt the ground rumbling underneath him as the demon followed, letting out an ear-splitting roar that shook the trees on the edge of the school grounds. He looked over his shoulder—and despite the obvious fear and conviction that he was going to die, Yugi couldn't help but notice;

There was something strange about the way it was moving…that was to say, it wasn't moving like Yugi would expect a huge dragon-demon thing to move—

"YUGI! AHEAD OF YOU!"

Yugi whipped his head around just in time to see a large tree trunk coming up fast.

"_Shit—!"_

Once again, his body acted on his own; before he knew what was happening he had jumped, grabbed the nearest tree limb, and was swinging upward into the forest behind the school. Having no light to go by he grabbed blindly, his hand wrapping around the next solid thing it could reach.

An explosive splitting and creaking sent splinters flying everywhere, ricocheting off of Yugi's back, making him flinch and nearly lose his grip; the demon had taken a swipe at the tree Yugi had jumped off of.

He grabbed again at the darkness in front of him, trying not to panic as he heard sniffing, and something Yugi could only guess was a tongue shifting amongst spit. When his hand didn't come across anything he tried again, frantically reaching as far as he could—

Yugi felt the demon's lizardlike tongue graze his side.

"YAAH!" he yelled, and he let go completely of the branches.

Down he fell, landing face-first on the ground. Ignoring the severe pain that shot through his torso, he scrambled up again and ran, trying to focus on the uneven ground ahead of him instead of what was behind him—

The demon bumped him in the back, shoving him forwards. He stumbled, trying to force himself to run faster—he couldn't see—he could smell that rancid breath again—

He lost his footing and fell, flipping over to see a large, blue, glowing eye only inches from his face.

Yugi didn't move; he was too terrified to move.

…The demon didn't move, either.

* * *

Silence.

Kaiba tried not to think of what that probably meant…instead, he grit his teeth and pushed himself off the ground, trying to ignore how his right side felt numb…

When the demon had started running, he had fallen behind quickly, as he was already winded from trying to get over to the school fast. The demon's tail had smacked into the same side he'd gotten hit on before and he'd fallen, looking up just in time to see Yugi about to run into one of the trees on the edge of the track. He was surprised Yugi had heard him shout a warning—but even more surprised when he'd leapt up into the trees; he hadn't thought Yugi to be the acrobatic type…

Kaiba spotted the splinters and chunks of the tree the demon had slashed apart, and the large gap in the trees where it had charged into the forest. He hoped the demon hadn't gotten him; Kaiba hadn't heard screaming…not that that meant much...

One thing was for certain, though; Yugi definitely knew about the demon, and how it had been inside Yami…but he didn't mention the necklace.

Did he not know about that?

Furthermore, how did the demon manage to come out in the first place?

Kaiba shook his head; he'd have time to figure it out later, granted he didn't get killed. Before anything else, though, he needed to figure out how to end this nightmare…

Somehow...

* * *

For what felt like the longest, most agonizing moment of Yugi's life, he and the demon stared at each other, perfectly still. Yugi didn't even breathe, he was so mortified. He could see now why Kaiba had just stared at the demon's eye; it didn't seem like an eye at all—more like a vortex, drawing his attention deeper into an endless, cloudy abyss…

Yugi blinked, and averted his gaze; he didn't want to end up like Kaiba. With that thought, Yugi looked for both of the demon's front feet, expecting to have to dodge those claws…

But they were both on the ground.

So what was it waiting for? It had just chased Yugi down and cornered him—why hadn't it just killed him, already?

Not that Yugi wanted to be killed, but still; it wasn't making sense—

It started sniffing. First off to Yugi's slight right…then a little closer to him…and then further away again…

Now Yugi was just confused; what could it possibly be looking for now? The demon was staring right at him—

Wait a minute.

Yugi's mind flicked back to when it was running; it hadn't been looking directly at him, then. Its head had been tilted off to one side…the same side…but it had still been running straight for him…

It was using sound to locate things. And with all their yelling and screaming, it hadn't been hard at all…

Did that mean it was blind?

The demon sniffed further away from him, more deeply this time.

But that still didn't make sense; Yugi would have thought it wouldn't be that hard to locate someone who'd just been running for his life, even without being able to see them…

Maybe its sense of smell wasn't good, either…?

Come to think of it…now that he was close, Yugi noticed that it didn't look healthy at all; its skin was sagging and discolored in spots…and some of its scales around its eye looked like they were coming off completely. Its breathing was heavy, too, even though it couldn't have done much more than trot to chase after Yugi…it seemed sick.

Was it dying…?

* * *

Kaiba looked down at the staff that had somehow stayed in his hand during both his falls. It had been glowing when the demon was coming, which meant that it definitely had a connection to the demon. Plus, if he remembered the story right, this staff was what the priest had used to summon the demon in the first place—which would explain why it didn't look like it had aged, at all…

He thought back to the reaction his uncle had had when Kaiba had shown the rod to him; he'd literally quivered in fear, even though Kaiba was sure his uncle had never seen it before in his life; it was always locked away in his father's study, which his uncle had never bothered to go into. And if that was any indication…

Kaiba forced himself to stand. He hoped this worked…

Gathering together what energy he had left, Kaiba tilted his head back and shouted,

"DEMON! SHOW YOURSELF! I _DARE_ YOU!"

* * *

Suddenly the demon's head snapped to the far right, and it let out a roar. Despite himself, Yugi let out his breath in shock and covered his ears. Thankfully, the demon decided to take off after whatever it had heard in the other direction and charged after it, flattening everything in its path as it did so.

Yugi scrambled to his feet again, watching as the last bit of tail slithered out of his immediate vicinity. For a moment he just stood there, listening to his heart pounding in his ears…his sides hurt; worse than they ever had before…

He needed to get back to the track; he didn't want to get lost in here…

* * *

Kaiba heard a roar from the trees on his left, and felt the ground shaking underneath him.

Perfect.

In an explosion of branches and foliage the demon came thundering out of the forest, headed straight for Kaiba. Kaiba stood his ground and shoved the staff into the air, shouting,

"REMEMBER _THIS?!"_

The staff started to glow again. The demon seemed to realize this and stopped in its tracks, letting out a high-pitched screech that cut through Kaiba's skull. The demon bent its head back as though it were in agony, rearing up onto its hind legs and stretching out large wings Kaiba didn't realize it had before. Kaiba kept the staff above his head, unsure of what it was actually doing, or what to do next—he hadn't thought that far—

He saw the demon's claws as a blur in the air above him.

"Gah—!"

He ducked, but not quickly enough; the demon's claws hit the staff, ripping it out of Kaiba's grasp and launching it across the field. Kaiba watched as it smashed right into the side of the school, the impact causing the handle to snap off.

He turned to the demon again—it was growling furiously, eyes glowing white with rage.

He ran for it.

* * *

Anzu was petrified. She hadn't seen Yugi since he had been chased into the forest, Yami was unconscious with no pulse (she'd checked), and Bakura had resigned to sitting as still as Yami, staring at the scene before him as though in a trance. And now Kaiba had made the demon even more angry by doing something with that glowy thing he had…Things were just getting worse by the second—

TING!

Anzu turned to see that whatever Kaiba had been holding earlier was now clattering to a stop next to her, in two separate pieces. Her first thought was that it was broken—but then she spotted the round part.

There was a long, thin knife blade attached to it.

She glanced back at Bakura and Yami; there wasn't much more she could do for either of them, now…

So she bent down, grabbed the dagger by its spherical handle, and took off.

* * *

He felt the ground rumbling underneath him more violently than he'd felt it before, and the demon's heavy breathing felt like it was right over his shoulder. Kaiba tried to push himself faster, but it wasn't enough—

"Kaiba!"

Kaiba glanced to where the voice was coming from, and was appalled to see someone sprinting directly towards the demon—a girl…

Above his head, the demon's head whipped around towards her, sniffing wildly.

"_YOU TWIT!"_ Kaiba yelled, stumbling to a stop, "DON'T DISTRACT IT!"

But it was too late; the monster lunged for her with an almighty roar. She screamed and ran faster, narrowly missing large, sharp teeth as the demon snapped at her.

"_WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU__DOING?!"_ Kaiba shouted, even though she was now only feet from him.

"HELPING YOU!" She shouted back, shoving the rod in Kaiba's face.

Kaiba noticed a dagger sticking out from the top of the rod where the handle was before—and the person holding it.

"What are _you _doing here—!"

"Look out!"

Kaiba whipped around to see two rows of sharp teeth, headed straight for him. He leapt off to the side, feeling a wind and smelling an awful stench as the demon snapped its jaws shut. The demon lifted its head, and Kaiba saw that Anzu had jumped the other way. She was now looking up at the demon, focused on something—

The demon snapped at her, lightning fast, blocking Kaiba's view of her for a split second—but then it let out that high-pitched screech again and whipped its head back into the air, shaking it violently. Kaiba thought he saw something coming from its head—

"Here!"

Kaiba turned to see the staff flying at him. He caught it with both hands, and saw that the blade was covered in some dark, thick liquid.

"Get its other eye!" Anzu yelled.

Kaiba had to leap out of the way again; the demon had aimed for him now, smashing into the grass when it didn't get anything. Seeing his chance, Kaiba jabbed at the part of its left eye that was the closest, ripped the knife out again and scrambled away, narrowly missing getting nailed with its claws, as it roared and took a swipe at him.

The liquid he'd seen on the blade oozed out of the demon's eye, and the white-blue glow stuttered out. Kaiba didn't realize how much light the demon's eyes were actually contributing to their being able to see until they went out; everything around them seemed really dark, now.

_Great…_

Keeping his eyes on the demon, Kaiba tried to think quickly of what else he could do with this dagger. It was his only weapon, so he needed to use it effectively—because there was no question of letting it go like this, in Kaiba's mind; even with its eyes stabbed out, it could still cause a lot of damage to a lot of people.

He ran a little further away, as the demon started whipping its head around again, screeching.

It was obviously susceptible to being hurt, now that it was in this world completely…

But how much damage could he do to the demon with this small of a knife? It would be like trying to debilitate a person with a needle—

"Yugi!"

Anzu was running towards the gap in the trees the demon had made. Yugi was now lying facedown on the edge of the tree line.

The demon lowered its head again and roared in their direction, splattering black blood everywhere.

He needed to find a weak spot. Somewhere where a needle really _could _do damage—

Kaiba's eyes widened; he'd just gotten an idea.

He sprinted towards the demon again.

"HEY!" He yelled, "DEMON!"

When the demon didn't respond, Kaiba did the next best thing besides yelling; he ran over to the part of the demon that was nearest to him—its foot—and stabbed at the softest-looking spot on it.

It worked.

The demon threw Kaiba off, sending him rolling down the track again. He got up, and waited as the demon turned its back on Anzu and Yugi and aimed for Kaiba, jaws open wide.

This time, he was ready.

In the last possible instant he dodged the demon's teeth again, his arm shooting out and grabbing what he saw first—a large spike of armor pointing out behind demon's jaw. Then he jumped, and at the same instant, the demon's head launched into the air again.

He landed right where he had meant to, amazingly enough—right on the back of the demon's neck. He didn't waste any time in trying to situate himself, as he knew he probably didn't have much time before he was noticed anyway—

The demon froze, a low growl rumbling up its throat.

Shit.

Kaiba didn't move, thinking too late that it would be really easy for the demon to throw him off from up here, with a more than likely chance of outright killing him in the process.

Which is exactly what it tried to do.

Kaiba clung to the segments of armor that covered the demon's neck, as the demon thrashed its head, whipping it back and forth—

Kaiba closed his eyes—he felt a gust of wind kick up behind him and he lurched forward, feeling a short, frightening moment of weightlessness—

But he wasn't falling.

Warily, Kaiba opened his eyes, and found that he was still on the demon's neck…but the _demon_ was launching into the air, stretching its neck towards the black sky. Kaiba hung on, trying to regain his sense of awareness; his head was spinning…

It didn't help to look down; the demon was making a vertical climb. How it could without its eyesight was beyond Kaiba, but he didn't really have time to think about it…

He searched the segments of armor in front of him; there had to be somewhere—

There it was.

Right underneath the thick shell that covered the demon's head, there was a bare spot. And if dragons were made the same way as every other reptile, Kaiba could safely assume that that's where the base of its brain was.

The demon lurched forward again, with an angry snort. Kaiba pasted himself to its neck, wondering what on earth it was doing now—

Oh, god.

Kaiba watched in horror as the demon whole body aimed downwards again, pointing straight at the field they had just left. Then it folded its wings, and let gravity do the rest.

Kaiba was smashed against the back of the demon's head, his stomach running right into one of the spikes that stuck out from its head. He didn't bother to check if he was bleeding—all he saw was that he was right in front of that bare spot.

It was now or never.

He lifted the dagger, focusing on his target so intently that everything else seemed to fade away—the demon beneath him, the frigid wind whipping around him…even the ground speeding up towards him.

All he saw was a long, thin blade, glinting in the glowing lights below as it pierced through the demon's skin, slicing through muscle and scraping against bone.

* * *

A/N: And yes, the demon is modeled after the blue-eyes white dragon. It _was_ the high priest that originally summoned it after all, wasn't it?

Hee.

Also…I owe an apology to everyone here, for taking this long to update; to be honest, I kept on putting it off, in light of that thing called life. It's amazing to me that it's already been a year, and four months before that when I really stopped working regularly on this. It hasn't seemed like that long at all...

Still, I'm back now (really), and am going to finish this thing, once and for all.

This fic is almost three years old, for god's sake. And I have a really cool ending…

But first, we need to see what happens to the demon, yes? And Kaiba. And everyone else…

So until next time (which is less than a year),

—Trem.


	34. The Aftermath

A/N: This would have been out sooner, 'cause I had a version of this saved on my laptop where I've been working, but…the power cord died. And then college came and said, "I'm making you bleed from your ears with knowledge! Brah!"

So, I'm starting over on my old PC in my basement, typing bits at a time.

Chapter 34: The Aftermath

* * *

"KAIBA!"

Yugi was leaning heavily on Anzu's shoulder when she shouted; now, he shakily disentangled himself, and turned as best he could towards where Anzu was gawking—and just about fell over in shock.

Kaiba was on the demon's neck, reduced to nothing more than a blur as the demon whipped its head and neck from side to side, obviously trying to fling him off.

"What the hell is he thinking?!" Anzu exclaimed, panicked, "He's going to get _killed_!"

The monster roared angrily, shaking its head even more violently. Yugi's foot rolled underneath him, and a searing pain shot up his leg, making him stumble.

"Oh!" Anzu grabbed Yugi's shoulders again, and pulled him up. "Sorry!"

Yugi just shook his head absently, trying to block the pain out of his mind enough to keep his eyes on the demon in front of them…he needed to see what was coming next, as it was their only chance of getting out of this mess in one piece. Although Kaiba obviously wasn't thinking along those same lines…

He couldn't have just ended up there for no reason; he had to have had something in mind— that's why he'd caused a diversion. And Yugi knew it wasn't because of his foot injury…that'd be too brash for him—

"Yugi, we need to get you further away before anything else happens to you," Anzu was saying nervously, pulling Yugi's arm that was around her shoulders, "let's go over to where Yami is—"

"He's trying to do something to the demon," Yugi said, eyes glued to the spectacle.

Anzu froze.

"Like what?" she asked apprehensively.

Yugi blinked.

"…He's got that dagger, right?"

He looked at Anzu. Her eyes widened.

"You seriously think he's trying to kill a thing _that_ size with—"

A strong, cold gust of wind slapped them both, pulling their hair back and freezing their faces.

"What the—?!"

"Look!" Yugi said.

The demon had stretched out its massive white wings and was beating them with swift, powerful strokes, each one stronger than the last. Yugi and Anzu squinted against the wind, bracing themselves as it escalated. Debris started to fly off the ground and whip past them, and the demon started to lean over towards them, as though it were falling—

"Watch out!" Anzu screamed, and Yugi found himself getting thrown to the ground just as the demon's head swooped by where he and Anzu had been standing, screeching as it went…

It barely grazed the trees as it lifted off, soaring into the sky at an angle that was so close to vertical that it looked eerie—like something was pulling the it up by strings…

And for a short moment, Yugi found himself struck with awe as he watched the demon change before his eyes; all its bulky armor joints and plates flattened at once into a seamless mass, streamlined and smooth, propelled by wide, thick wings that made it seem as though the demon was levitating to the sky…it just seemed natural there…

"Wow," Anzu whispered.

Yugi turned; she was looking up, too.

"…We should probably get back to Yami and Bakura," Yugi said, after a moment. Anzu snapped back at the mention of Yami's name, and she sprung off the ground, saying,

"Oh, geez, I hope they're okay—here—"

She pulled Yugi's arm over her shoulders, and together they started to make their way as quickly as they could across the field.

Yugi didn't quite know what was wrong with his foot, as he hadn't gotten the chance to look at it yet; it had just started hurting the minute he put his weight on it, after he'd tripped.

It had been a pretty spectacular fall, too—it was completely unexpected, leaving Yugi flying through the air, suspended in shock. Then he had hit the ground face-first, smashing into grass that he'd thought was rotting….until he had realized what was making the smell was the demon's breath coming at him, full blast. That's when he found out about his foot, because he stood—and fell over again, as a wave of hot pain shot up from his foot.

He'd started to panic at that point, as the demon had opened his jaws, ready to really eat him this time, he was sure—and that was the exact moment when Kaiba had done something to catch the demon's attention, making it focus on him instead. Anzu had grabbed Yugi at this point, and had hauled him out of the direct path of the demon, painful foot and all.

He was still stuck on that…and he kept trying to shake it off, but…somewhere deep in the back of Yugi's mind, a little thought kept nagging at him, replaying Anzu's actions in his head as though they were foreign, and confusing—

"Hold on."

Yugi stopped.

"What?"

Anzu scanned the sky, apprehensive.

"…Where do you think the demon's going?"

Yugi looked up. An irregular, silvery shadow shimmered above the park, still gaining altitude.

"It looks like it's going straight up…"

And as they both stared at it, the demon's wings started to slow down….and stop. Anzu gasped in horror as the demon then pointed itself towards the ground again, and folded its wings in.

"_Oh, my god, It's crashing—!" _

"_Crap!_" Yugi said, backing up, "We need to get to cover, _NOW_!"

The both of them took off, Yugi's foot forgotten amidst the adrenaline rush as they sprinted towards the overhang where Bakura and Yami were—

REEEEAAAAAAAAAAACK!

Anzu screamed, and covered her ears. Yugi's foot gave out again, and he stumbled and rolled, getting completely disoriented as he tried to figure out why his ears were throbbing—

"AGH!" he shouted, as his foot flared up again, "Shit—!" He came to a stop on his stomach, grass smashed against his face—

"_Yugi!"_

He barely heard Anzu's voice over the otherworldly shrieks that were coming from the demon—nonetheless Yugi flipped over and pushed himself off the ground.

The demon was thrashing wildly, desperately in midair, screaming in agony. Blood was flying profusely off the demon's head and neck, filling the air with thick drops of black blood. Yugi watched, transfixed, as the demon shot towards the earth like this, screaming all the way—

_BOOM._

It was as if the field had just been bombed. The ground shuddered violently with the shock, pieces of turf went flying through the air, some of them as big as Yugi's head. Yugi barely dodged a huge chunk of dirt that flew his way, exploding on impact next to him, showering him with wet soil.

"Ack—!"

Yugi hurriedly tried to get the dirt off his eyes so he could open them again—he could hear the demon's desperate movements, and things cracking, and snapping—

He wouldn't think the sound that came out of the demon next was even possible; an ethereal, haunting screech erupted from the demon, shooting through Yugi's eardrums like a hot needle. His eyes shot open and he put his hands over his ears, watching as the demon struggled not 15 feet ahead of him…

It was trying to move its legs, but they were obviously broken; Yugi could see the bones stretching the skin in its forelegs, turning at angles he knew weren't possible otherwise. Yugi could see that the fact that it couldn't move was making the demon panic, causing it to struggle like a wounded animal that had gotten spooked.

As Yugi watched, however, the movements got less and less agitated…the screaming had less power behind it…pretty soon, its movements had reduced to half-formed lunges, giving the impression that it was reaching out to something, instead of trying to get up again—

Suddenly the demon lifted its head again, jaws open in a silent roar. It stayed like that, and Yugi could hear its labored breathing over the ringing of his ears. If the demon's eyes hadn't been gouged out, Yugi thought they would be wide open right now, growing dimmer as time stretched onward, slowly, until it seemed to pause altogether in that one moment…

The demon's body relaxed, and its head and neck fell heavily back to the earth.

It was dead.

* * *

It was really warm…like he had fallen asleep under the sun….

White and blue blinded him, burning its image onto his retina before he squeezed his eyelids shut again, turning his head away. He felt the back of his head shift against something soft and cool, that gave to the shape of his skull.

Slowly, he reached above his head, and felt the material beneath him with a dry, hand.

Sand.

…Where …?

* * *

"Kaiba!"

Yugi turned towards Anzu's voice. She was getting up on Yugi's right, eyes searching the demon. Yugi followed suit, trying not to move his leg more than he absolutely needed to; he didn't consider it a good sign that the pain was spreading…

Warily, Anzu crept carefully through the debris towards the demon's neck.

"….Kaiba?" she asked quietly.

No response.

She stepped closer, tentatively extending a shaky hand.

"Hello?" She asked quietly, "Kaib—AH!"

A black hand shot up from the other side of the demon's neck, making Anzu leap back, nearly tripping over backwards on the uneven ground. The hand made a wet slap as it grabbed the nearest armor plate, and pulled the rest of Kaiba's body into view.

Anzu breathed a sigh of relief.

"Oh," she said, "You scared…me…"

Her voice died out as Kaiba pulled himself to his feet; if she had been planning on saying anything else, it was probably driven from her mind.

Black demon blood was dripping from Kaiba's arms and shirt; he was completely soaked, save for his face; the blood stopped at his chin, and everything above that was relatively untouched—although looking at it now, Yugi almost wished Kaiba's expression was obscured with blood, too…

His eyes were cold and disconnected, full of a quiet fury that chilled Yugi, making something deep inside him suddenly cold and frightened just by looking at him. He looked like he wasn't alive, inside; there was only that empty, cold stare. He looked like a murder.

He blinked; it made Anzu jump. Slowly, he looked around himself, taking in the damage. His eyes lingered on Yugi, halfway off the ground…then on Anzu, standing three feet from him, looking torn between fear and worry.

"Where's Yami?" He asked. Yugi suppressed a shiver; he sounded as dead as he looked…

"He's…over there," Anzu said quietly, pointing towards the school, "under the overhang—"

Kaiba took off, brushing so closely by Anzu that he made her hair flutter as he went by. Both she and Yugi watched, stunned, as he darted through the debris, the dagger still wet in his hand, still flicking blood onto the already soaked grass. When he made it to even ground, he broke out in a sprint, reaching the overhang in no time, and stumbling to a stop when he got there. He then kneeled next to Yami, letting the dagger fall onto the pavement with a clatter.

He looked Yami over, eyes darting up and down the length of his body; he wiped off his hands on the grass and felt Yami's hand, his forehead, his neck…after an agonizing moment, he moved his fingers, and tried a different spot.

Then another…

After trying to find Yami's pulse in a fourth spot, Kaiba stopped. And even though he was halfway across the field, Yugi could see the slight slump in Kaiba's shoulders, and how he let out a long-held breath.

That didn't look too good—

"Hey."

Yugi looked back; Anzu was standing next to him, holding out her hand.

"We should go over there," she said quietly.

Yugi found himself looking back at the demon. He didn't know what it was, but…he almost felt like something was pulling at him…like…something wasn't finished yet…

He shook his head, and took Anzu's hand.

Now wasn't the time to think about that…

* * *

Slowly, he opened his eyes again.

He was on his back, staring at a clear blue sky. Out of the corners of his eye, he saw yellowish-orange. A hot breeze blew past him again, carrying a thin cloud of dust with it. It got in his nose, and he coughed a little; he realized he was laying in the shade of something…something big…

* * *

Together, Yugi and Anzu made their uneven way over to the overhang where Yami and Kaiba were. Bakura was still sitting in the spot where he'd fallen, however long ago it was…it looked like he'd fainted.

"Does Yami have a pulse?" Anzu asked, when they'd gotten close enough.

Kaiba didn't answer; he seemed to have stopped thinking, after he'd looked Yami over, and was now just kneeling there, staring…

"Kaiba?" Anzu asked again.

Nothing.

"Kaiba!" Yugi snapped.

Kaiba's head jerked slightly, and he turned his attention towards Anzu and Yugi. He looked dazed.

"Sorry," he said, his eyes not quite meeting theirs, "I was thinking."

"Does Yami have a pulse?" Anzu asked again.

Kaiba looked at the grass.

"No," he said quietly.

Yugi pulled away from Anzu and hopped over to Yami, stopping at his feet; it was the part of him closest to Yugi. Anzu rushed to his other side, immediately checking his pulse. He looked pale…blue, almost…

"He's like ice," Anzu said, pulling her hand away. She clutched it with her other hand, in an attempt to warm it.

For a long moment, nothing was said. No one moved.

Oddly, Yugi found himself thinking back to what Bakura and Yami had been talking about, when he and Anzu and the pharaoh were hiding in the bushes; they'd mentioned something about how Yami and Kaiba had been friends, at one point…and how Yami had defended Kaiba…and there was a certain desperation in Kaiba's movements earlier, and a certain sadness about him now that stood out to Yugi…it made him think that if he knew nothing else about Kaiba except what he saw tonight, he'd think Yami was Kaiba's closest friend.

Maybe they were, at one point. And maybe, deep down …Kaiba still thought of Yami that way, even though Yami certainly didn't think of Kaiba like that.

It made sense, in its own way…

The three of them jumped; something was moving in the corner, groaning.

"Bakura!" Anzu exclaimed.

Sure enough, Bakura had come to, looking completely disoriented.

"Are you all right?" Anzu asked.

Bakura lifted himself up to a sitting position, grimacing and holding his head. He looked vaguely at Anzu when she asked the question, but he didn't really respond to it. Instead, he looked blearily at the rest of them…then at himself.

"What the…hell…where…?" he asked groggily, rubbing his temple, "Why am I…?"

The three of them watched, as the mist in Bakura's brain started to clear; Yugi was just waiting for what he knew was going to happen next…

Suddenly Bakura gasped, his eyes widened, and he shouted,

"YAMI! Oh, my god—" he practically leapt over to where Yami was, putting his hands on Yami's shoulders again—just like he was doing before the necklace acted up.

"Yami!" he said, giving Yami's shoulders a shake, "Yami are you—" he gasped again; his hand had grazed Yami's skin.

"You're—he's…" he gingerly touched Yami's cheek again, recoiling at Yami's cold body. He fell silent.

"…Bakura?" Anzu asked again, tentatively.

Bakura looked up at her, eyes wide.

"Why is he cold?" he asked quietly.

Anzu bit her lip.

"We don't know what's going on."

Bakura and Anzu looked to Kaiba; he was still staring into space, frowning slightly. Now, he blinked, and looked at them both.

"I don't think it's what it seems like, though."

"You mean it's part of the curse, then?" Anzu asked.

"What happened before I came?" he asked.

"He started hyperventilating," Yugi said. Everyone turned to him.

"Hyperventilating?" Kaiba asked.

"Yeah," Yugi said, frowning in concentration as he tried to remember, "and he was holding his necklace…it looked like he was having a heart attack, or something…then he fell, you tried to revive him," he pointed to Bakura, "And then that white light…"

"I think it was coming from Yami's necklace," Anzu said, "That's what I thought when it was happening, anyway..."

Yugi nodded in agreement.

"And then the demon came out?" Kaiba asked.

"Yeah," Anzu said, "I got knocked over, and when the light was gone…there was the demon."

Kaiba looked back down at Yami, frowning again…

"…wait…"

Everyone turned to Bakura.

"…What are you guys talking about?" he asked in a small voice.

"We're talking about Yami's curse," Anzu said.

"…curse?"

Anzu's eyes widened.

"He never…told you?"

"Told me about what?" Bakura asked, looking around at them all, "what's wrong with Yami? He's…he's just knocked out, right?"

No one responded.

"_Right?"_ Bakura repeated, raising his voice.

"No one knows what's going on with him," Yugi said.

"It doesn't even make sense…" Anzu said, "the curse was supposed to make him immortal—"

"That was assuming that the demon would stay inside," Kaiba said heavily, "Now that it's dead…"

He didn't finish.

"You're not serious about this, right?" Bakura asked, breaking the silence.

Kaiba raised an eyebrow.

"I hardly think this would be a good time to start lying—"

"When did you get here, anyway?" Bakura interrupted, eyeing Kaiba. He still seemed dazed from having fallen unconscious, making him look slightly deranged.

"What's the last thing you remember?" Kaiba asked.

Bakura gave them all the same wary glance he'd given Kaiba.

"Who are any of you? And what's going on with Yami?"

"We're friends of Yami's," Anzu said, "I'm Anzu, and this is Yugi—"

"Bakura."

Bakura turned back to Kaiba. He had reached under Yami's jacket collar, was pulling out the little gold chain until the pendant fell out. Kaiba then picked up the pyramid, and held it out his hand.

The second Yugi laid eyes on it, something sparked in the back of his mind; a feeling he couldn't quite explain…

Kaiba frowned.

"Wait a minute, he said, "It's warm…_really _warm…"

"but Yami's stone cold," Anzu said, "How's that even possible?"

"Feel."

Anzu put a finger to one of the sides.

"It's…body temperature…" she said, looking very confused.

"What about it?" Bakura asked.

Kaiba held it out to Bakura as far as the chain would allow, saying,

"You recognize this, right?"

"Yeah," Bakura said, glancing at it, "Yami's dad got that for him for his birthday when he went to Egypt for a summer."

"For his tenth birthday, right?"

"…yeah, I think…"

"He lied," Kaiba said, closing his hand around the pyramid.

Yugi blinked; the feeling vanished.

Bakura shot him a confused glare.

"What the hell are you talking about, Kaiba? How would _you_ know?"

"Because I'm connected to the curse."

"Wait—you are, too?" Yugi asked, surprised that there was even _more _to know about this mess, "Since when?"

"You didn't know that?" Anzu asked.

"You did?"

"_I_ didn't," Bakura said, "All I know is that I'm in a _really_ bad dream, right now—"

"You woke up," Kaiba said shortly, "You're not dreaming."

"Then why the hell are you guys talking about curses and demons and shit while Yami is laying here dead?!" Bakura yelled, pointing dramatically at Yami.

"Yami's not dead—" Kaiba tried to say—

"He's _COLD_!" Bakura shouted, the panic now evident in his voice, "He's _cold_, Kaiba! He already feels dead—"

"YAMI'S NOT DEAD!" Kaiba yelled, blowing Bakura's protests away with a booming voice Yugi didn't think was in him.

Everyone jumped at his outburst. Bakura looked genuinely unnerved. Kaiba closed his eyes and clenched his fists, straining to contain himself. One hand was still closed around the pyramid.

"I don't know how, but I just know he isn't," Kaiba said, his voice forcefully calm. He inhaled deeply, and opened his eyes again.

"Not that that makes any sense," he said quietly, more to himself than any of them. He let go of the necklace, letting it roll to a stop on Yami's chest, and put his hands on his knees.

"_None_ of this makes sense…"

Yugi barely heard his last remark; for some reason, he found his eyes glued to the dwindling motion of the pyramid rolling on Yami's shirt, and how it glinted in the street lights nearby. It was stopped by the zipper on Yami's jacket—

Yugi shook his head; how was that interesting? He never was engrossed in small things like that. Why was he staring now? Why was this pull so strong—

"Hey, Kaiba," Yugi found himself saying. Kaiba looked in his direction, not moving. Suddenly, Yugi felt…awkward…

"Um—" he said, gluing his eyes to the ground, "Could I see the—necklace?"

Kaiba didn't respond right away; he just simply stared at him.

"You can come over here, if you want," Anzu said, not seeing Kaiba's reaction, "Do you need help moving?"

"No, I'm fine…" Yugi said, shaking his head; why did his mind feel so _cloudy,_ all the sudden? Was his foot really causing him to shut down like this—?

"…Yugi?"

Yugi looked at Anzu.

"Huh?"

"Are you all right?"

"Yeah, yeah," Yugi said quickly, getting on his hands and knees. He crawled over to Anzu's side, careful to keep his injured foot from dragging on the pavement. Anzu picked up the necklace, and held it out for Yugi when he'd sat down again.

Seeing the necklace so close made Yugi freeze, for some reason. He found himself staring at it, transfixed…

"Yugi."

He knew Kaiba had said his name, and a part of him tried to look up…but his muscles weren't responding—nothing was responding…his mind was blank—

"Yugi!" Kaiba snapped.

He saw his hand reaching out, his fingers stretching towards the pendant…

"Don't touch the necklace, Yugi!" Kaiba was saying, "Something's not right!"

His index finger just barely grazed the tip of the pendant.

Immediately, he wished he hadn't; he felt a jolt shoot through his arm, and his vision became cloudy—he felt pressured—like something was crushing him, pulling him into a blackness that wouldn't let him out gain—he wanted to scream, but he had no control over his body anymore—he had no control over anything—

A rushing started to block out sound in his ears…

He couldn't see anymore…

* * *

He sat up.

All around him was nothing but desert. And behind him…

He looked up, shading his eyes from the sun with his hand.

It was a huge…pyramid….

* * *

"_Shit_, not him, too!" Bakura yelped on Anzu's other side, as Yugi suddenly went limp.

"Yugi!" she said again, shaking him; he'd fallen over awkwardly across Yami's torso and Anzu's lap.

No response.

"Does he have a pulse?" She heard Kaiba saying.

She put her finger to Yugi's neck.

"...I don't feel anything," she said.

"What the hell was _that_?!" Bakura asked shakily.

"I really have no idea."

"H—he just…touched Yami's thing a—and…" Bakura stammered; he really seemed to be losing it, now.

"I know," Anzu said, feeling for Yugi's pulse again.

"Maybe they went to the same place…"

"You think so?" Anzu said, looking up at Kaiba. He was shaking his head.

"I don't know," he said, "just a thought."

"Ah," Anzu said.

Bakura put his arms around his knees. Kaiba was brooding again, head down.

Carefully, Anzu rolled Yugi's body off of her lap, and laid him down beside Yami.

"I _hope _they went to the same place," she said.

"How is that hopeful?" Bakura asked flatly.

"Well," Anzu said, sitting down next to him, "two heads are better than one. If they're stuck in the same somewhere, they might be able to figure out how to get back."

Bakura sniffed.

"Where do you think they are?" he asked.

"I don't know," Kaiba said, "I just know they're not dead."

"How?"

Kaiba looked up at Bakura.

"He never _did_ tell you, did he?"

"No, he didn't," Bakura said, his eyes narrowing to a glare, "but it's none of your business!"

"You're his best friend, though," Kaiba said, sounding genuinely confused. "Of all the people to not tell—"

"SHUT UP!" Bakura yelled, "It's bad enough I have no idea what's going on, I don't need YOU to rub it in!"

Kaiba put up his hands.

"I'm just surprised, that's all."

"Oh, you're surprised?!" Bakura shouted, "I'm scared _shitless_! Okay? So just _SHUT UP_!"

"Bakura—" Anzu tried to put her hand on his shoulder, but he slapped it away, saying,

"Get away, I don't know you!"

Anzu put her hands in her lap. Bakura put his head down, hiding his face between his bare knees.

"I don't know what's going on, or what's happening, or anything else! All I know is that Yami seems dead, and I—can't—do anything about it!"

He broke down crying.

Anzu stared at the pavement. She was at a complete loss as to what to say.

* * *

As he was staring at the pyramid towering behind him, he started to become more aware of himself…and where he had been before he was here…

He'd passed out. Just like he had when he had been in front of the library…but this time…he'd woken up somewhere else.

So what did that make him now? Was he awake? Was he still unconscious? Dreaming? Or was he…

A loud, sudden sound jolted him out of his thoughts, and he scrambled to his feet, looking around. It had sounded like an explosion—

The ground started to shake underneath him. Startled, he fell off-balance, and ended up backing into the pyramid's wall.

"Agh! What the—?!"

"REEEEEEEEEEAAAAAACK!"

A loud, ear-shattering scream drowned out his thoughts. Another shadow obscured the pyramid's shape on the sand…

Yami looked up to see a large, silver dragon fly above him, very low to the ground, wings outstretched from a streamlined body, eyes wide, blue, and fierce. It flapped its wings rapidly, gaining altitude and speed with every moment Yami stared after it.

He watched it fly off into the distance.

What had _that_ been…?

Something moved out of the corner of his eye, making him jump again. This time, though, Yami found a person standing next to him.

He was wearing long, white robes that flowed in the light breeze, circling around him as though they were floating on their own. The only parts of him that were exposed were his hand, which held a golden staff, and his face…

He had stark blue eyes, made even more noticeable from his tanned skin. He, too, was watching the dragon as it flew off into the distance, expression grim.

Yami stood there awkwardly, not really sure if he should move or not. After all, he didn't even know where he was right now…and why did he seem so familiar, to Yami? He was sure he'd never seen this guy before in his life—

Suddenly, Yami's vision blurred. He blinked, thinking it was sand in his eye, or something like that—but then it got worse. Exponentially worse….things started swirling around him, the images in front of him blurring and fading…the man started to disappear…

"Yaaaagh!" Yami exclaimed, as the ground gave way underneath him—suddenly he was falling through a cloudy space, bombarded with whispers and images all around him, blanketing him, sucking him in—

Soon, there was no more blue sky, or pyramid, or anything else. All Yami knew was that he was falling through what felt like water, even though he could still breathe in it like air…

What was going _on_?!

Where _was_ he?

* * *

A/N: Yeah, it's kind of weird, but all will be revealed shorty!

Until next time!

--Trem.


	35. Trapped

A/N: Another chapter! Lots of goodies in this one….

Chapter thirty-five: Trapped

* * *

"Yugi."

He heard the voice though a haze, as though his head was stuffed up and he couldn't hear properly.

"Wake up, Yugi."

Yugi didn't remember falling asleep in the first place…but he was lying down, as though he had…

He opened his eyes. Blearily he stared at the ceiling, with its aged, worn bricks—

Wait.

He'd fallen unconscious outside. And the school's ceiling didn't have bricks…

He pushed himself up to a sitting position. He was in a small square room, with a fire lit on one side. And on his other side…

* * *

Another image started to come out of the abyss and form itself around Yami, with walls and a floor that he could stand on. As the image became clearer, Yami realized he was standing in someone's room. There was a bed not far from him, and on his other side, possessions were set neatly on a table. Cloths were draped over the walls, woven in patterns Yami didn't even recognize; all he could see is that they looked very…traditional. Like something he'd see in a museum. A light, warm breeze was blowing through a window with no glass, or shutters. It swirled around Yami, cooling his face and skin from the suffocating, dry heat that he was starting to notice. It must have been summer, wherever he was.

Yami heard footsteps. He froze, not knowing where they were coming from, or what to do about the fact that he was very obviously trespassing—

The cloth behind him flew up, revealing a door and a person walking through it.

"Gah!" he yelped, and jumped to the side.

The person coming through didn't seem to notice; he walked right by Yami, a bored expression on his face.

Yami froze, feeling even more awkward than he had before. He figured it was only a matter of time—

The person turned around abruptly, as though they had forgotten something on the other side of the cloth door.

He looked right through Yami, as if he weren't even there. Yami gawked back at him, shocked …

The man had Yami's hair. Right down to the last drop of dye. And his eyes were mahogany. Yami had never seen anyone else with those eyes besides himself.

The man blinked, and looked away again. He headed towards the balcony.

Yami followed, if nothing else than to keep his eyes on this entity before him. The more he looked at this man, the more familiar he seemed….

* * *

"_Atemu?"_

The pharaoh nodded, a small smile on his face. Yugi took a good look at the person next to him. He looked a lot different than he had before…

"Y-you're…_alive_?"

"I am always alive," the pharaoh said, looking down at himself, "But now…just as I am before curse."

He held up his tanned hands, his smile widening at Yugi's confused expression.

"I am saying I am solid, now. See?" He put his hand on Yugi's shoulder, and shook it a little. It was very warm. Yugi noticed that his bracelets were all gold, now.

Yugi noticed his voice sounded stronger, too; before, he'd sounded as though he really was talking from beyond the grave, his speech distorted, and ethereal. Here, though…he looked and sounded very much alive.

Yugi looked around again at the small room.

"So…where is _here,_ exactly?"

* * *

The man walked across the balcony, and put his hands on the stone railing with a long, heavy sigh. Yami followed hesitantly. When he had crept up beside him, Yami saw that he was staring forward, a thoughtful look on his face. Yami looked forward, too.

The balcony was obviously built in a high place, because it towered over the blanket of buildings below, stretching out into the far distance and beyond. They were so high up, in fact, that the roads below stretched out before them like a map, interlacing and webbing from each other, filled with activity. People and oxen and carts and brightly colored things moved through the streets, lined with buildings made out of stones, clay, and wood, all adorned with the same colorful garments that passed by them, some with writing on them, some just patterned together. Yami could see large storehouses from here, as well as carts, markets, side streets, houses…everything. Everything to see could be seen from this balcony.

Yami stared at the view, marveling at how intricate it was. He thought he could see at least three different neighborhoods from here. And the closer the buildings were to the building they were in, the more important and fancy they looked.

Yami looked at the man next to him again. He seemed like he was important, too. His stance, his clothes, his expression…they all exuded some kind of high standing. Yami wondered who he was…

* * *

"You are inside my prison," the pharaoh said, "Where I live for three thousand years."

Yugi cast another look at the small room they were in.

"_Well_," he said, "I can see why you try to get out…."

The pharaoh laughed a rich, full laugh.

"This is not all, Yugi! If this is all, I go crazy long time ago! I never get out!"

Yugi pulled himself to a sitting position, careful not to move his leg.

"Okay, so where's the rest of it?"

"Oh, it come and go," the pharaoh said, waving his hand, "it is all depending on what demon is thinking."

Yugi tried to wrap his mind around that sentence, but to no avail.

"That didn't make any sense," he said.

"A lot of things do not make sense," the pharaoh countered, "For example—how do you get here?"

"How _did_ I get here?" Yugi echoed, frowning, "I was…."

"Attracted to necklace?"

"Yeah…" Yugi said slowly, as the memories came back to him, "and then—"

"You touch it, and come here."

Yugi gave Atemu a strange look.

"How do _you _know?"

"I am telling you before," Atemu said, casting his eyes down, "I see only you, and what you see. Here is not too different now…"

"…wait…" Yugi said, putting everything together; the sudden urgency of his sudden infatuation with Yami's necklace…

"did you…_bring_ me here?"  
"I have no choice," Atemu replied quickly, "I am needing help. I…I cannot do this on my own."

"…Do what?" Yugi asked apprehensively. This couldn't be good….

* * *

The man sighed again, looking very bored. Yami thought he looked young—not much older than Yami himself. It made him wonder if he wasn't the son of some rich person, or something…

Suddenly, the man's eyes focused on a spot behind Yami, and he straightened, suddenly curious. Yami turned to look.

It was that thing Yami had seen in the previous…place, or vision, or whatever it was; he could tell by how fast it was moving, and how it was glinting a shimmering silver color in the bright sunlight.

"Uh-oh," Yami said, quickly tracing the creature's flight path with his eye; it was headed right for the city below them at lightning speed, wings tucked in, mouth open wide. Yami froze, realizing that the air before the creature was rippling, changing…then shooting ahead of it, as though the air was rippling like water—

BOOM.

It came like a bomb, shaking the city below them, blasting the streets with a wind strong enough to knock over carts and people. Yami had his hands over his ears and was behind the railing when the sound wave hit. Not that it helped much; the roar was a thousand times louder than it was before, a haunting, ethereal screech that pierced through Yami's skull as though someone had smacked his temples with a sledgehammer.

He saw the man yell and fall next to where Yami was, shielding his eyes from the wind that came with it, filled with sand and grit from the landscape below. The balcony shook violently underneath them, and Yami clung to the railing, hoping desperately that he wasn't subject to physical harm in this strange, illusionary limbo he'd ended up in….

* * *

"This is about Yami, isn't it?" Yugi guessed.

"I sense him in here," Atemu said quietly, looking up at the walls around them, "Even though I cannot see beyond this room, I know he is here…"

"Sense him? Like you did at the basketball game?"

The pharaoh nodded slowly, scouring the brick that surrounded them with his gaze, as though he were looking for something.

"…So," Yugi said after a moment, hesitant to interrupt Atemu's thought process.

Atemu blinked, and turned his mahogany eyes on Yugi again. Yugi was thrown for a moment; he'd never seen that color eye before…

"Um," he said, giving his head a shake, "You never answered my question."

"Which one?" Atemu asked lightly.

"Where are we? I mean, are we in some…actual place, or are we floating in some weird space like before?"

The pharaoh let out a small, abrupt laugh.

"You want to know where my prison is, then? In 'actual place', as you put it?"

"Well, yeah," Yugi said, "I mean….if it's some weird dimension, I can't rely on the laws of physics, can I?"

The pharaoh laughed again.

"What?" Yugi snapped, "I'm serious!"

"I know you are!" Atemu exclaimed, controlling himself, "You are just strange to me, Yugi."

"And what's that supposed to mean?"

"I never have someone come in here before now," Atemu said, "I wonder many times how someone act when they come here. I do not expect fis—fisic….whatever you say."

Yugi rolled his eyes.

"Back to Yami," he said, "…if the demon controls what this place looks like…what's supposed to happen after it's died?"

Atemu shrugged.

"I do not know. It never happen before."

"_You're_ a help," Yugi replied darkly, shooting a glare at Atemu. Atemu put up his hands, eyes wide.

"I am telling truth! I do not now what happen now!"

"You've been here for the past three thousand years!" Yugi exclaimed, "Don't you know how this place _works_?!"

"Do not yell!" Atemu snapped, "I am two feet in front of you, no need to yell!"

"Well then stop confusing me!" Yugi snapped back, "It's bad enough I have to go find Yami for you, but I've got to do it with a messed up foot!"

Atemu blinked.

"Your foot is what?"

"It's broken, or something, I don't know….it really hurts, though…"

Atemu tilted his head to the side.

"Does it _really_ hurt?"

"Well yeah, every time I move it," Yugi said, pulling the blanket off his leg, "It's probably swollen—"

Both feet looked the same. Yugi frowned.

"…what…?"

He moved his foot slightly, gingerly—nothing. He moved his leg. Still nothing.

"When Yami pass out," the pharaoh said, his tone serious, "He still there, yes? He do not fade away?"

"…No…" Yugi said slowly, moving his leg some more. It was fully functional.

"The same happen to you, then," Atemu was saying, "Your body stay. But the rest of you come here."

* * *

The sound stopped as suddenly as it come, leaving a loud ringing in Yami's ears. Immediately, the man next to him shot up and glued himself to the railing, scanning the city below him with sharp, red eyes. Yami was surprised at how scary he seemed now; the very air around him felt electric, and his eyes seemed to blaze in their deep red color. Yami found the strength to get up again, wanting also to see what was going on below.

The thing was hovering above the city, taking in the chaos that was quickly starting to elevate below as people below realized what had caused the blast; Yami could hear the screams…

"'Themu!"

Yami looked behind him; another person had joined them on the balcony, and was now kneeling at the feet of the red-eyed man. He was dressed in less fancy clothing; just a white cloth wrapped around his torso and waist. He looked much darker than the other man, as though he spent most of his time outside.

The red-eyed man spat out another word Yami didn't recognize. It must have been an order to speak; the other man quickly scrambled off his knees, and started shooting out a language Yami didn't recognize. He couldn't really put a finger on what it sounded like, either.

Whatever he was saying, though, it must have been very frightening; his eyes were wide as he talked, and his voice wavered. He pulled something out from his belt as he talked; a roll of thick, yellowish paper. He held it out to the red-eyed man, who snatched it from his shaking hand—

Another tremor shook the balcony beneath them, and another scream from the creature pierced the air. The frightened man let out a yelp of his own as he caught sight of the beast and ran back inside, shouting the same word over and over as he went. Yami guessed he was going to go tell the others inside about the cause of the sound boom.

Meanwhile, the red-eyed man had ripped open the little roll of paper, and was now glaring at it, looking even more livid than before. He cast another look at the creature, which was now hovering just feet above the buildings below, and threw the paper down at his feet, roaring,

"_SEEEEEEEEET!"_

For a man so small, his voice was extremely loud, and deep. Yami stepped away from him; his hair seemed to be standing more rigid than it was before, as though the man's anger was turning into visible energy before Yami's eyes. Seconds later, Yami realized that it _was _visible….

He heard a crackling sound, and the man focused on the creature below him. In his right hand, a ball of light started to form, large an opaque. Yami only had a second to look at it, before the man gave out another angry yell, and threw it, lightning-fast, at the creature ahead.

Yami watched, stunned, as it shot through the air like a missile, hitting the creature on the side, knocking it out of the air. The creature shrieked as it landed on the buildings below, causing a cloud of sand and dust to rise high, obscuring the creature for a moment.

The man wasted no time; he grabbed the side of the railing of the balcony with his left hand, and made another swift movement with his right—a band of white energy formed before him, hanging in the air. The man then grabbed it as though it were a board, hopped to the top of the railing, and leapt off.

Yami ran to the edge and looked down just in time to see the man put his feet on the white light he was holding and shoot out from the building, a trail of light tracing his direct path towards the thick cloud of dust. He formed more spheres of light as he went, throwing them as quickly as they appeared into the dust cloud.

Below him, Yami heard more shouting, and looked down to see armored men on foot, running through the streets of the city towards the creature, who was screeching again—

And then Yami's vision started to get blurry.

"No!" He said aloud, rubbing his eyes. It didn't help; the vision was fading again. Yami didn't know why, but he felt like he needed to stay here, to see this disaster that had befallen this city through to the end. He felt like was being pulled away from someone close, and he was afraid he would never see them again…

The feeling got stronger, as the city started to swirl around him again, blurring together like a watercolor painting that was getting washed out. It got so strong that Yami felt as though as he was going to burst, and all he could think of doing as the last colors faded away was yelling,

"WAIIIIIIT!—"

* * *

"So…what part of me _is_ here? My…soul?"

Yugi had never believed that there was a soul before now, but he was thinking he could easily change his mind on that one.

"Every part of you that is not body is here," Atemu replied, "and because you do not think body and soul separate, you look like you do when they are together."

Yugi thought about it for a moment. He decided that it made enough coherent sense.

"So that means I can stand up, and all that…because my soul, or whatever, doesn't have a sprained ankle?"

Again, Atemu laughed..

"Yes, this is what I am saying. You can stand. You can walk on ceiling, if you want. You need to, if you want to go some places here."

"Wait…what does that mean?" Yugi asked, suddenly apprehensive again.

"It is depending on where you are," Atemu said, glancing again at the walls, "This is not part of outside, so there is no ceiling, no up, no down. Only mind and heart here. Sometimes it is hard to go places, because you fear of it, or something in it….and here, there will be wall if you realize fear….you cannot go through."

The pharaoh sighed.

"I do not want to bring you here, first. It takes long time to get used to guarding feelings. But this is what is needing to happen now. I cannot do this alone anymore…."

Even though he was looking away, Yugi could see his eyes become full of that intense sadness Yugi had only seen in him once before—back when Atemu had fist appeared, and was trying to tell Yugi who he was.

It made Yugi feel bad for the pharaoh. He could tell that in a perfect world, Atemu would have taken care of everything on his own. He didn't want to bring Yugi here—wherever here was—because it was like admitting defeat to himself. But, for the sake of finding Yami and ending all this madness, Yugi had to be here. _He _was the one that everyone needed.

In an effort to shake the odd feeling that washed over him now, Yugi pulled the blanket the rest of the way off, and stood up.

"So" he said awkwardly, "how…do we find Yami?"

* * *

Yami found himself flying through a flurry of visions next, as though someone was thinking of them very quickly in their mind….

The first scene he saw was of two children, playing in the sand. They didn't look very old—maybe about five or six, the both of them. They were both considerably darker than Yami was, and they had the same style of clothing on as the people did in the previous vision. At the moment they were both squatting, watching a strange-looking bug crawl by them. One of them was taller than the other, with large, crystal blue eyes that were sharp and attentive. The second one had spiky long hair that stuck out at odd angles. Yami saw the shorter child's large crimson eyes, and realized that he must have gone into the past to when the man he'd just seen was younger. After all, who else could it have been…?

The bug skittered off. The both of them watched it shooting across the sand for a moment. Then, with barely a glance at each other, they both leapt up simultaneously and tore after it. The crimson-eyed child broke out a loud laughter, which made the other child laugh. Yami didn't get to hear what it sounded like, though—for the minute they started to run, the scene started to fade away into a blur of tan and blue…

It didn't take long for the next vision to replace it. Again, the same two people were sitting in front of Yami. Now they were older—probably around fourteen or fifteen—and they were sitting on a stone bench, holding wooden tablets on their laps. The taller one was engrossed in a piece of parchment stretched over his tablet, blue eyes flicking back and forth quickly. The other boy was looking at his tablet too, but he seemed to be having trouble comprehending; his eyebrows were furrowed in concentration, and his finger was tracing the line he was reading. When he reached the end of the line, his finger stopped. His brow furrowed more.

"Eh?"

The other boy looked up, and asked,

"Nah, salgri ne?"

He was given a glare, and some kind of retort. Yami had no idea what they were saying; he wished he could put a finger on what language they were speaking…

Suddenly, the blue-eyed boy smacked the other boy on the head with his tablet.

"Ah!" the other boy exclaimed, "Sal na, Set!"

He smacked him back. The blue-eyed boy narrowed his eyes, and a tablet fight ensued. They both started to laugh, and chase each other around the room. It didn't last long, though; the crimson-eyed boy ran right into a taller, grown man, who had his arms crossed and was looking down at them both. Yami guessed by both the boy's expressions that he was their teacher, or guardian, or something. Yami didn't get to see what happened to them, though; the scene was changing again.

He saw them next when they were older—probably around Yami's age, now. They were standing on opposite ends of an arena, packed with people. Yami was on the sidelines, in between the two. The crowd was cheering, chanting in that same language. The crimson-eyed boy looked like he did in the first vision now; he was as tall as Yami, his hair arranged like Yami's, his eyes blazing with determination. Yami felt that same electric energy coming from him just before he saw it form an outline around him. On the opposite side, the other boy did nothing. He merely stood there, staring at the other with cold, calm eyes. He held himself differently than when he was younger, Yami noticed. He seemed more serious than he had before. Briefly, Yami wondered what happened.

The energy around the red-eyed boy started to grow, and he clenched his fists, glaring at his opponent. He was ready.

The moments stretched onward. The crowd started to cheer more wildly than they had before. Instinctively, Yami reached for the chain of his necklace, feeling the nervous excitement thick in the air—

His fingers felt nothing. Startled, Yami felt his neck for a sign of the chain. Then he felt for the pendant under his shirt.

It wasn't there.

"_What—?!"_

* * *

"I feel him here," the pharaoh said. "But I cannot see where I am, anymore. I give this power to you."

Yugi frowned.

"Wait….power?"

The pharaoh looked away from Yugi, focusing instead on the corner of the room farthest from them.

"Yes," he said simply, "I do not tell you before, because you are afraid. But you need to know now."

Yugi felt his insides go cold on him, as the pharaoh gave out a short sigh, and turned to face him.

"Remember what I say when I see you for first time?"

"Yeah," Yugi said, "You said that you just knew I was the one that would be able to see you."

The pharaoh nodded.

"Yes," he said, "and this is true. But…I do not tell you all the truth when I say this."

"What do you mean?"

"ehm…" the pharaoh said, waving his hand, "how do I say…I…I give you help, Yugi, ehm…I give you power to….see…and hear….what is not existing, for others."

"You…gave me the ability to see what doesn't exist?" Yugi asked flatly; he was extremely confused.

"That doesn't make any sense."

The pharaoh sighed again.

"I will show you," he said.

He walked over to one of the walls of the room, and put his hand on it. He stayed like that for a second, as though he were listening for something. Then, abruptly, he shook his head.

"No, it is not that way," he said, as he passed Yugi on his way to the opposite wall, where he did the same thing. This time, though, he paused to listen longer than he had before.

"Here," he said after a moment, beckoning Yugi over. His bracelets clinked together in the process, making his arm sound like a pocket of loose change. Yugi obeyed, and stopped in front of the wall. The pharaoh grabbed Yugi's hand, and put it on the same spot he had been touching.

"Do you feel?"

Yugi waited for something to happen. But all he felt was rough brick under his hand.

"No," he said, "I just feel the wall."

"No, no, not in hand," The pharaoh said, "This world is made of mind and heart. You cannot trust eyes to see what is there, or hand to feel what is real. Close your eyes."

Slowly, Yugi closed his eyes. He didn't understand quite what Atemu was saying, but he just went with it.

"Do you feel?" Atemu asked again.

This time, Yugi waited before answering. He knew he felt the wall, and he knew it was still a wall whether his eyes were open or not….but there must have been _something_ Atemu was picking up on…

* * *

Frantically, Yami felt his neck several times over, looked down his shirt, even checked his pockets—but the necklace was nowhere to be found on him, or near him.

He felt a blinding panic come over him; his head suddenly was swimming, his heart rate was out of control, his breathing quick, and shallow. He felt weak, and dropped to his hands knees, staring dimly at the sand between his outstretched fingers.

What did this mean? _Where was he?_ Was there any turning back?!

The crowd's cheering got louder; something was happening on the field, but Yami didn't know what. All he knew was his shallow breathing, and the lack of a chain around his neck. Frantically he clutched his neck, and felt the cold clamminess of his fingers against his hot neck. He needed to get out of here. He needed to get back to the school, to his friends—he didn't know where he was, but all he wanted to do now was to go back to where he was, to wake up and tell Bakura he'd tripped over something and was fine, so that they could get on with whatever they'd been talking about—

BOOM.

An explosion of white light brought Yami back to the vision in front of him—the red-eyed man had just shot a jet of white energy at the other man, barely missing his face. The other man had yet to move—he still stood as he had been, not even blinking as the blast behind him blew his hair into his face.

Yami knew he should have been reacting to what was in front of him, but all he could think of was the fact that the necklace had suddenly disappeared, and it was nowhere to be found. Did that mean the demon had him?

His hands clutched at the thought, one clawing at his chest, the other grinding loose sand into the hard ground just underneath the surface.

Yami took a deep breath, and screamed out to a deaf, illusionary world the one word that filled his panicked mind;

"_HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELLP!"_

* * *

A charge of energy shot through Yugi's arm, making it tense for a split second. Startled, Yugi's eyes shot open, and he leapt back from the wall.

"Whoa!"

Atemu watched Yugi's reaction calmly, his expression understanding.

"Do you feel now?"

"What _was_ that?!" Yugi exclaimed, shaking his hand, "I felt like I just put my finger in a light socket!"

"You feel what is on other side," the pharaoh said. "You feel what Yami is feeling, because he is only other soul here, besides you and I."

"That…was _Yami?_" Yugi asked quietly. He looked down at his hand.

"He is in pain," Atemu said.

"So….I can feel what others are feeling now?" Yugi guessed.

"No, that is only here, not outside," Atemu said, waving his hand, "what I give you is more useful."

He reached over and took Yugi's hand again, dragging him back to the wall and putting his hand in the same spot.

"I give you power to see what others can not see. Yes, that is the right way to say…"

Yugi cast a glance at the pharaoh. He didn't meet Yugi's eyes, as he said,

"This…is how I make you see me, who is like ghost outside."

Yugi looked at the wall again.

"That's…that's why Yami couldn't see you," he said, understanding now, "Or anyone else…"

"Yes," the pharaoh said solemnly.

A long moment passed between them. Yugi felt numb, suddenly.

"So you _picked_ me," he finally said.

"You are smart, Yugi," the pharaoh said, "You already have mind that would make good use of this power."

Yugi took his hand off the wall, and turned away.

"Do not get angry, Yugi!" the pharaoh said, "I only do this to break curse—"

"So this entire time, I've been seeing you only because you put some spell on me?" Yugi said.

"What are you thinking before, Yugi? That you are only seeing me because this is destiny?"

Yugi was silent.

"I am sorry if I make it seem like this," he heard the pharaoh saying, "I do this many times before. Every time, the power is given back to me because the person die without using it. They are scared, they do not understand. I know you are different Yugi!"

Yugi let out a dull laugh.

"How do you know that? By how I reacted when I first saw you? I thought I was going crazy…" he said. He turned to Atemu, and was met with only a soft expression; the pharaoh had been expecting this conversation all along.

"I have been invisible to most of outside world for three thousand years. I become very good at seeing what is inside people—"

"And what's inside me that's so different?!" Yugi interrupted, his voice echoing off the walls, "Just what about me made you think that I'd be completely fine with being given the ability to see freaky supernatural things?!"

"You will use this power as well as it can be used," Atemu replied calmly, "You already think like this power."

Yugi shook his head. He felt like he was going to burst with emotion…although he really didn't understand why….

"This _entire time_, you've been telling me that I'm the one that needs to talk to Yami, I'm the one that needs to help you…but if you could do all this before on your own, why couldn't you give _Yami_ the ability to see you?"

"Who is standing in this room with me now?" Atemu asked. "If I give Yami this power, Yami die in here. And curse would not break. I would be trapped here forever, with no way out."

"Why should I care about you and your stupid curse?" Yugi spat out.

The minute the question came out of his mouth, he regretted saying it. What made him even more guilty was what Atemu responded with, in that same calm voice;

"Do you care about death of someone as young as you? As punishment for something they did not do?"

Yugi was silent.

"Think of my time, Yugi. Think of how many times I see this. I see family torn apart. I see children die because of necklace. I see lives ruined because of necklace. I see love ruined. All for something that I do, three thousand years ago."

"….What _did_ you do?" Yugi asked quietly.

Atemu sighed another heavy sigh.

"When we find Yami, I tell you," he said. "For now, you must learn to use what I give you."

Suddenly, Yugi felt a weight on his shoulders. He looked up, and saw that Atemu had put his hands there, and was looking Yugi in the eye, now.

"Are you ready?"

Yugi looked down.

"….Sorry about what I said."

"It is only natural you are angry," Atemu said. Then, he turned Yugi around, and steered him back towards the wall again.

"Now, we must find Yami. He is in pain now, so it will be easy to follow his feeling. He will not die here, but if we are not quick, he might lose his body. Like me."

Yugi tried not to think too much about that last comment. Instead, he motioned to put his hand back on the wall.

"No no no, you do not need that now," Atemu said, pulling Yugi's arm down again, before putting his hands back on Yugi's shoulders.

"What is happening _now_," he said, "Is that you make doorway to Yami."

"I….what?" Yugi asked dully.

"Close your eyes," Atemu instructed. Yugi did so. "You remember feeling?"

"Yeah," Yugi said, remembering clearly the electric energy that shot through his arm, and how his muscles had seized up for a split second. His arm felt sore from that, now…

"Try to find, again."

In his mind, Yugi brought back the feeling. Then, he dug up an image of Yami from his memory; he was sitting in class behind Yugi, on his left…no one else was in the classroom…

"Put them behind wall," Atemu said.

Yugi imagined a wall coming up in between him and Yami, right down the aisle between them, stretching the length of the classroom.

"See a door, in the wall."

A wooden door with a brass knob appeared in front of Yugi.

"Now….open door, with your hand," Atemu said, tapping Yugi's hand.

Yugi got up from the desk in his mind, and physically reached out to grab the brass handle.

His hand wrapped around a doorknob. Yugi froze.

"Do not open eyes," Atemu said, "You will break the spell."

Yugi squeezed his eyes shut, and clutched the door handle. He turned the knob, and shoved the door open.

He felt the weight of the door as he pushed against it, felt the air being pulled out the other way….

"Now," Atemu said, "open your eyes."

Yugi did.

Laid out before him, through the same wooden door that he'd seen in his mind, was a large, cavernous space, full of walls and stone doorways and stairways as far as the eye could see, all made of gray, weathered stone that reminded Yugi of a cathedral. They were arranged every which way, like an Escher painting; some stairways were upside-down, some were sideways, some led do nowhere….there were bridges between platforms with doors, stairways leading to more doors, and doors that led to nowhere, all woven together in a giant, incomprehensible knot of architecture that bent his senses of direction, just by looking at it.

"This is what I mean," Atemu said, coming up beside him, "Do not trust what eyes see. It is not as complicated as this."

Yugi cast another glance at the maze in front of him. He felt dizzy just looking at it…

"Come," the pharaoh said, patting Yugi's shoulder, "We must find Yami."

So he walked out the door, and down the stone steps that led to down and to the left. Numbly Yugi followed, pausing to stare at the door he'd just created—and just how real it was—before pushing it shut again, and rushing to catch up with the pharaoh at the bottom of the stairs.

* * *

A/N: So yeah, that's my rendition of Yami's soul room. And three guesses as to where they are, and the first two don't count! And I'm sorry for the long wait. I know I say that every time, but I do mean it…


	36. The Search

A/N: Man, everyone's in different places, and they're all doing things at the same time…this chapter's going to be fragmented…

Chapter thirty-six: The Search

* * *

Anzu didn't know how long she stayed on the ground, kneeling next to Yugi. All she knew was that her mind felt a different kind of numb from the rest of her body. The frigid air was creeping in around them, seeping up through the pavement, slowly freezing them from the bottom up. Yet still they sat there, watching over Yami and Yugi's still bodies as though they were going to just wake up at any moment…Sure, the possibility was there, but Anzu didn't think this would be that easy.

Bakura was still crying. He seemed more pale than he had before, if that was even possible; he was very fair to begin with, not including the added effect his white hair had on his skin. Anzu couldn't tell if he was shivering from the cold or from his emotions.

She felt extremely bad for Bakura; she couldn't imagine what he was going through right now. Of all the ways to find out about Yami's curse, and he had to _see_ it…

She looked down at Yami and Yugi again.

"You know," she said quietly, "it does no good to just sit here like this."

Kaiba's blue eyes flicked towards her before going back to their distant, brooding stare.

"What else is there to do?" He asked. His voice sounded dead.

"We could make sure they don't get hypothermia, for one."

"They don't have a pulse," Kaiba said flatly, "They'd be cold no matter where they were—"

"So there's really nothing we can do for them, now? At _all_?" Bakura asked; his voice was sharp and loud, piercing through the quiet that had settled since Yugi had gotten knocked out.

"And how do _you_ know anyway?" Bakura shot at Kaiba, "What makes you so goddamn qualified that you can tell us what happened?"

Kaiba shook his head.

"It's just a guess," he said. His tone was neutral.

Bakura let out a scoffing sound, and brought his knees to his chest.

"You're just as clueless as the rest of us," he muttered.

Anzu saw Kaiba's eyes narrow, but he didn't say anything.

"It might be that their souls have gone somewhere," she said, voicing the idea as it came.

"That kind of shit doesn't happen," Bakura replied, rolling his eyes.

"So you don't believe in ghosts?" Anzu asked.

Bakura shook his head.

"I don't believe in anything like that."

"…So how would you explain what just happened—"

"It isn't our place to ask him that," Kaiba interrupted.

"…Why?" Bakura asked, looking confused. Kaiba blinked, and turned to look at them both, as he said,

"There must have been a reason why Bakura doesn't know about the curse. He's Yami's best friend. It must have taken a lot of effort to keep it from him. Yami couldn't have done it all that time if he didn't have a good reason. Therefore, the best way for Bakura to hear about it is from Yami himself. It's his curse, after all—"  
"But it's yours too, isn't it?"

Kaiba's eyes bored into Anzu's.

"What makes you think that?" he asked quietly.

"Yami told me," she said.

Kaiba's glance flicked over to where Bakura sat, and then back to Anzu. She knew he was probably trying to figure out how _she_ knew about it and Bakura didn't. But before either of them could react, a sudden loud ringing pierced the air. The three of them looked at each other, startled by such an ordinary noise…

"Whose cellphone is that?" Kaiba asked.

"Mine's on silent—"

"That's Yami's!" Bakura exclaimed, his eyes widening, "That's the ringtone for his house!"

It rang a second time.

Simultaneously, Anzu and Kaiba leapt from their spots; Kaiba checked Yami's coat and pants pockets, and Anzu stumbled over to where Yami's duffel bag had dropped to the ground, before he'd passed out.

It rang a third time.

"It's not on him," Kaiba said.

Anzu had torn open all the pockets she could find without breaking anything, digging through questionable socks and a cold, still wet basketball uniform before she saw a light flashing in the very corner of the main part of the bag. She grabbed for it, and pushed the talk button just before the fourth ring.

"Hello?"

There was a pause.

"Um…Hello? Is Yami there?"

Anzu froze; that had to be Yami's mother…that sounded too close to his voice to be anyone else…

"Um…." Anzu forced out. Bakura was moving as though he was about to come over and take the phone, but Kaiba beat him.

"Here," she heard him say. He was holding out his hand.

"Do I have the wrong number?" Yami's mother asked.

Anzu tried to respond, but her mouth seemed to have forgotten how to work—

Kaiba took the phone gently from her hand, and put it to his own ear.

"Mrs. Atemuryoku? This is Seto Kaiba," he said. His voice had that same mechanic tone;

"Yami can't answer his phone right now….he's unconscious."

There was a pause. Anzu could barely hear the voice on the other end now. Kaiba took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and started to explain.

"The demon came out of the necklace, and it knocked him out. He doesn't have a pulse, but I don't think that means he's dead. I haven't called for help because I didn't think it would be wise to take a cursed body to a hospital where they might ask questions—"

Mrs. Atemuryoku interrupted him.

"…No, the demon's gone now," Kaiba said after a moment, "it looked very sick when it came out. It was still hard to fight, but we managed to incapacitate—Yes, there are three others here…two are Yami's classmates, and Bakura's here, he came to watch the game—What?….Y—Yes, I can…..I will…..I'll call you from Yami's phone when it gets here, if it gets here before you do…we're on the track….okay. I'm sorry."

He hung up.

"Are they coming here?" Anzu asked.

Kaiba didn't respond; he was pressing the buttons again, dialing another number.

"Is this 911?" he asked, when the other end picked up. "Yes, we've just found two people that have fallen unconscious…."

* * *

"Do we really have to go through this entire place?" Yugi said, eyeing the endless maze of stairways and doors around them.

"No, if Yami help us," the pharaoh replied casually. His hand was on the wall next to him again, his eyes closed.

"He still has strong feeling," he said, opening them. "He still is in panic, I think."

"…how can you tell?" Yugi asked, trailing after the pharaoh as he continued walking along a narrow ledge between another wall and a large, impenetrable abyss. If Yugi had been less agile, the height would have made him nervous.

"I tell you before, this place is made from mind and heart. If you use mind and heart to find, you will find. If you use to feel, you will feel, and no more."

"So you've got to think your way through this place?"

"Yes," the pharaoh said. He'd stopped; the ledge had led to a dead end. Still, he was holding his palm in the air, fingers spread, as though there were sensors in his hand telling him where Yami was. His eyes were closed again, Yugi noticed.

"We go up wall, now," he said after a moment.

And with that, he lifted his leg and put his foot on the wall on their right, revealing a very skinny leg under his robes. Yugi then watched, speechless, as he pushed off the ground with his other leg as though he was stepping up a high stair.

And then he was sideways.

Yugi realized his jaw had dropped, and he closed his mouth again.

"It is easy," Atemu said, waving a finger to Yugi, and then to the wall, "You try."

"Easy for _you_…" Yugi muttered, approaching the wall. Tentatively, he put his foot on it.

"Move weight, now," Atemu urged. Yugi leaned forward, and put his hands on the wall. He carefully brought his other leg up.

"Whoa…." It was all he could say; he was on his hands and knees… sideways. But he wasn't feeling any different from when he'd just been on the ground—no pull of gravity, no muscles shifting to accommodate his weight sideways….the lack of any of this was a sensation that was indescribable. It did quite the number on his brain, and for a moment he stayed there, letting the awkwardness wash over him.

"Is not hard, yes?" Atemu's voice asked from above (or was it next to?) him, and he felt a nudge in his side from the pharaoh's sandal.

Slowly, Yugi got up, expecting to fall.

Nothing happened.

"That," Yugi said when he was standing, "was the weirdest thing I've ever done in my life."

"Is not that weird," Atemu said casually, walking on.

Yugi cast a look back at the short ledge they were just on. It wasn't very high at all; Yugi could have easily stepped over it, if he wanted to.

"No," he said, "That was _very _weird."

He ran to catch up with Atemu, who was already walking on, hand stretched out in front of him again.

* * *

Yami's outburst seemed to help. After taking a moment to breathe, the feeling of complete panic subsided enough for him to register his surroundings again.

The scene before him was chaos now; the two boys were fighting vehemently against each other, shooting blasts of that strange energy at each other so quickly that Yami could barely keep track of it…it was amazing to watch…their skills were matched, and they were both very strong.

The boy that looked like him was channeling that same white energy he'd used in the previous vision at the other boy, shooting it rapidly through his fists as he darted around the arena. He only paused to see where his well-aimed barrages of attacks were hitting.

The other boy, however, didn't move at all; he stood his ground, shielding himself with an invisible field from everything the other boy shot at him with barely a flick of his wrist. When he did attack, however, the energy came out as a whitish-blue beam, hitting the other boy in critical areas; chest, stomach…when he got the center of other boy's forehead, however, the barrages of attacks stopped abruptly. The crowd gasped.

When the dust cleared, however, they erupted in wild cheers. There was another kind of light coming from the shorter boy's forehead; a golden outline of an eye, shining brightly. With a shock, Yami recognized the shape of that eye;

That was an exact copy of the eye carved into his necklace.

The crowd was even more insane now, jumping in their seats, becoming more pumped by the second, as the eye grew more pronounced on the boy's forehead. Yami had no clue what was going on…

* * *

"So what's going to happen to you after this?" Yugi asked, after a while. By this point they had climbed up many walls and ceilings and other strange things—including an upside down stairway, which Yugi was just stepping off of.

"You are meaning after curse is broken?" Atemu asked.

"Yeah."

If the pharaoh hadn't spoken, Yugi would have wondered if he'd heard the question at all; he kept walking, hands out in front of him, as though the conversation was over. He would pause, studying the endless abyss before them quietly, red eyes narrowed in quiet contemplation.

It was only after another couple more staircases and particularly long stretches of wall (ground?) that he answered.

"I will not be part of this world anymore," he said suddenly, "I do not know if there is another I go to."

"But what about the afterlife, and all that? Like what they believed in ancient Egypt?"

Atemu let out a small laugh.

"It is not different from what you call heaven, I think. It is not matter if I believe or not."

Yugi nodded; seemed fair enough.

"So you believe in life after death?" he asked.

Atemu started up another sideways staircase.

"No," he said, "I am not, ehm….ca…car….what is word…."

"Care?" Yugi offered.

"I am not _care_, that is it," The pharaoh said, nodding. "It is scary first," he continued, "but I live too long. If I stop existing now, is not scary."

Yugi didn't respond; the unshakable calm that permeated the pharaoh's voice and presence was somehow unsettling; to be so unafraid of death…Yugi suppressed a shiver that wanted to creep down his spine.

"You are uneasy," the pharaoh said.

Yugi looked up; he had turned around and was standing still, right in front of Yugi. Yugi looked away.

"It's nothing," he said.

"No," the pharaoh countered, "you must open door. You cannot have feeling cloud mind, when you open door. It will make us lost."

Yugi blinked.

"Oh, yeah," he said, "that thing—what are you doing?"

The pharaoh was sitting down on the ground, jewelry clinking as he did so.

"We can not go on until you are clear," he stated calmly.

"Way to put me on the spot…"

The pharaoh shrugged.

"Let us talk about something else," he said, "It will make you calm."

Grudgingly, Yugi sat down next to the pharaoh, saying,

"I doubt it…."

* * *

Suddenly, white light flooded the area behind the boy, blinding Yami. Still, he kept his eyes on the scene, out of sheer curiosity more than anything.

He never found out what the light was for, though; the colors started to fade and mix together again.

"DAMMIT!" Yami shouted, "Not _again_! What the hell is this, anyway?!"

The scene blurred, and smeared. Yami resisted the strong urge to hit something, if only out of the sheer fact that there was nothing _to_ hit…

Defeated, he watched the colors of the next vision float into place before him. The next scene was indoors, in a large hallway. Yami easily found the boy that looked like him; he was standing at the very end of it, sitting on a very large, very ornate throne. He was in longer white robes now, which were decorated with golden patterns. Yami was off to the side, standing next to one of the large square pillars that were built all down the hallway. Behind him, hundreds of well-dressed people were lined up in the hall, all faced towards the boy in the throne. Music was playing, and there was an old, withered-looking man making motions and chanting fervently.

The boy stood. Yami noticed that there was a large golden crown on his head, in the middle of which was that same eye Yami had seen on his forehead in the vision before.

Now, he raised his hands, and spoke in a deep, commanding voice—like Yami had heard him use in the first vision on the guy that had brought him that message, before the creature came and started attacking the city.

Before him now, all the people in the hall and around his throne knelt down simultaneously. And as they did so, something clicked in Yami's mind.

He realized that this boy wasn't some rich man's son.

He was this place's ruler.

And he wasn't just in any place, either; there _had_ to be a reason that he looked so much like Yami…and what he was wearing seemed very reminiscent of the kind of stuff Yami would see in a museum. The thought had been nagging at him in every vision he had seen, but now he finally understood why.

He was in Egypt. Ancient Egypt. Which meant that the person whose memories he'd been seeing where this pharaoh's.

Yami's hand went to his neck again, milliseconds before he realized that he didn't have the necklace anymore. His eyes flicked back to the pharaoh. He wasn't wearing the necklace, either. But if Yami was really trapped in some kind of memory world, or illusion…had the _necklace_ put him there?

Did the necklace _want_ him to see this?

He frowned; did that mean…?

* * *

Atemu perked his head up as Yugi was sitting down, as though he'd heard something.

"What is it?" Yugi asked flatly.

"Yami is figuring out where he is," the pharaoh said, looking at the stone ceiling above them, "Maybe he tell us where he is…"

"How do you know where he is, anyway?" Yugi asked. He was promptly shushed, however, as the pharaoh strained to listen.

"Ssh!" he said, "he is thinking, I hear him!"

Yugi thought this was quite a change from what Yami usually did, but he decided to keep the comment to himself.

* * *

"Okay….thank you."

Kaiba hung up the phone, and put it in his own pocket.

"…didn't you say that it was a bad idea to take them to the hospital?" Anzu asked.

"Yami's mother wanted me to call," Kaiba said, as though that fact explained everything.

"How long until they get here?" Bakura asked, wiping his face.

"Ten, twenty minutes," Kaiba said. "They'll probably pronounce them dead, though—"

"You said he was alive!" Bakura exclaimed, his voice cracking.

"I said I didn't think he was dead!" Kaiba snapped, turning on Bakura, "Which is impossible enough, considering neither he nor Yugi have a pulse!"

"Well if they're not dead, then where _are_ they?" Bakura demanded. He got off the ground and stood, fists clenched.

"I don't know!" Kaiba snapped, "I told you that already!"

"Guys!" Anzu said, stepping between them, "We don't need anything else happening, all right? What about dealing with more important things, like what we're going to tell the medics when they get here?"

"What do you mean?" Bakura snapped.

"I mean that Kaiba told them that we came out and found them laying here like this. Does that mean we've been tinkering around here for three hours after the game let out? And how are we going to explain a dead dragon-thing on a torn up field? Did we find that, too?"

Everyone looked out at the field, having forgotten about the demon completely in light of figuring out if Yami was all right.

"…Wait…" Bakura said, squinting out at the field, "It was right there….right?"

The three of them turned stared intently out into the field, trying to find any sign of a large, broken, dead dragon spread out on the track.

Nothing was there. The field was completely intact, just as it was before any of them had set foot on it that evening.

* * *

As if in response to Yami's thoughts, the scene started to swirl in front of him again, fading into another memory. It looked a little darker than the others; as the walls around him materialized, Yami realized he was in a dungeon of some kind, standing in the corner. At first, he didn't know what a dark, musty room proved to him—but then he saw someone hanging by their wrists not far from him.

"Gah!" Yami exclaimed, startled by the gristly sight; it was a man, shirtless, covered in large open wounds that were still bleeding. For a second, Yami thought he was dead.

Then he heard a slow, long groan.

Yami stepped back, even though he knew he couldn't be seen. Slowly, he crept around the periphery of the room, trying to see the man's face—

SLAM.

Yami jumped; the boy—former boy, now—that looked like him had just stormed into the room, swooping down on the prisoner, yelling in his language at the top of his lungs. Yami stood where he was, shocked, barely discerning one word from the next. The man pulled out a scroll of paper that looked an awful lot like the one that Yami had seen the messenger give to him in the very first vision; he waved it in the man's face, his red eyes burning in a wild, thundering fury.

The prisoner didn't say anything, throughout the tirade. He didn't move at all. It was only at the very end of the boy's rant that he slowly lifted his head, letting a little of the sun that came from a window far above shine onto his face.

Yami gasped; crystal blue eyes, dead to the world, looked up at the young pharaoh. It was his old friend, Yami realized. The one he'd played with as a kid, and whom he had fought against later.

The one who'd watched that thing head for the city that the pharaoh obviously lived in, probably knowing the damage it would do.

And in that same moment, Yami finally realized who the appearance of this friend reminded him of;

Seto Kaiba. If he had been a few skin shades lighter, he would have looked exactly like him…

"'Temu…" he said. His voice was parched, rough—not like Kaiba's at all.

The pharaoh simply glared at him. His former friend then started to smile, showing bloodied teeth—it gave him the look of an animal who'd just struck its prey, waiting for it to die. He started to speak, then, in that same raspy voice.

What he said, though, Yami didn't know; as he was listening to his speech, hoping to glean at least something from it, the edges defining where one object ended and the next began started to fade, blurring together into a mass of color again…

* * *

"He is…seeing something…"

Yugi was on his back, now; a long, boring silence had followed after Atemu had told him to shut it, and Yugi had finally gotten tired of just sitting there, so he'd laid out on the stone floor instead, staring up at more stone. Now, he turned his head in the direction of the pharaoh.

"What's he seeing?" he asked dully.

The pharaoh was frowning in concentration, his eyes closed. Suddenly, his expression turned to a confused one.

"He is seeing…me, but….I am not as I am now…I am…."

He opened his eyes.

"I am in life."

Yugi pulled himself up; Atemu looked bewildered.

"So he's seeing you before you got cursed?"

He nodded mutely.

Yugi looked at his feet. The pharaoh had said that they were in a world made up of the heart and the mind…maybe that had something to do with it.

But what kind of place was that?

* * *

Anzu found herself walking out onto the field again, looking for the damage, hoping that it was just a trick of the light.

But the demon really wasn't there anymore. Neither was the damage.

"Did….any of that actually _happen_…?" She asked aloud.

She turned back to Kaiba and Bakura, illuminated under the school's outdoor lights. Bakura stared out at the field, arms crossed, shivering. Kaiba was scouring the darkness with his eyes, his face set. Anzu thought he seemed extremely sad.

They all were.

"Maybe it went somewhere else," Bakura said, his voice shaky.

"No," Kaiba said.

"…Why not?" Anzu said.

Kaiba just shook his head.

"It's gone," he said. His tone made the statement final, and neither Anzu nor Bakura argued it.

Anzu looked out at the field again, and the forest beyond. The darkness seemed impenetrable now, so large and sinister. Like a forest in a horror movie, full of things to jump out at you, and scare you. Yet Anzu still stared into it, hoping to find something, somewhere, that would give a clue as to why everything was back to normal—

She blinked.

She thought she'd seen something on the very edge of the field, darting into the trees. She strained to hear the inevitable crunch of leaves. All that met her ears was cold silence—

"Anzu."

Anzu looked over her shoulder. Kaiba was looking at her, his hands in his trenchcoat pockets.

"If you walk any further, we won't be able to see you."

"…Oh," Anzu said, shaking her head. She turned, and started to walk back.

"Sorry, I didn't notice…"

* * *

"Are we in your consciousness?"

The pharaoh opened his eyes.

"What are you saying, Yugi?"

Yugi shrugged.

"Well, if Yami's seeing you when you were still alive, then he must be seeing your memories. Either that, or he got thrown back in time, or something. But you said that this place was made of the heart and the mind—that's why we can get around just by thinking about who we want to find, right?"

The pharaoh nodded.

"Yes, he is seeing memory….I do not know about the rest. I do not know what this place is. I know I can come out to real world, and that I am pulled back after time."

"Still," Yugi said, getting excited, "if he's seeing your memories, doesn't that mean that we just have to open the door to your past life?"

For a moment, the pharaoh considered. Then, he nodded slowly.

"Yes," he said, "I am thinking that will work."

He looked at Yugi.

"Does that mean you are ready to go on?"

Yugi nodded.

"I think I get it now."

The pharaoh's face broke into a wide smile, and he stood.

"I am glad, Yugi. I know that giving this power to you is a good thing." He held out his hand. "Come."

Yugi took his hand, and pulled himself up. He closed his eyes and envisioned a door in front of him. This time it looked old, barely hanging onto its hinges. He felt Atemu's hand on his forearm.

"I am seeing memories, now," he said, "It is all right to open."

Yugi took a deep breath, pictured Yami on the other side, reached out to the rusted

handle in his mind's eye, and pulled.

* * *

When the blurriness had focused into an image again, Yami found himself standing on a balcony, over what looked like the same city he'd seen the pharaoh looking down at before. The pharaoh and his friend were with him, which Yami knew now was the priest, Set. Yami could tell this was taking place after everything else he'd seen; Set had a scar across his face that Yami had only seen on him in the dungeons.

The two of them were standing, facing each other in silence. Again, Yami crept along the edge of the balcony to get a better view of what was going on. The pharaoh was holding out his hand to the other, his face set.

Set smirked, as though he had gotten his way in a deal. He reached into a small pouch that hung at his hip, and pulled out something Yami didn't even see at first, as his hand was covering it completely. But then he let his fingers relax over the pharaoh's hand, releasing a small golden chain…and before it even reached the pharaoh's palm, Yami recognized it.

That was Yami's necklace. The family's curse.

His eyes widened, and he inhaled sharply. He was watching the pharaoh become cursed, three thousand years ago. The priest gave it to him. He'd been friends with the priest as a kid. But then they'd become enemies, or had a falling out, or something—for now the pharaoh was glaring at him, his stature proud and defiant. He looked as though he knew what was happening, and he was ready to accept it.

With horror, Yami watched as the pharaoh unclasped the necklace and pulled it up around his neck, sealing the fate that would haunt his descendents for generations to come.

Yami had always thought that if he could have gone back to this moment, he would have found some other way to deal with the demon that the priest had released into their world. He didn't know what, but anything had to have been better than to shove the load off onto everyone else after him…

Now he realized how shallow that thought was. The priest was obviously smart, cunning, controlled. He seemed like the type of person who could coerce someone into a corner they never saw coming with his words alone. The kind of power Kaiba had, sometimes. Except never used it like this. Set seemed to use it to manipulate, to tailor the people around him to his liking.

Yami shivered at the thought. He got the feeling that, even though he couldn't understand what anyone had said, Set's powers of persuasion in the dungeons had something to do with how Priest Atem had ended up in this mess—and why Set was walking free again.

After Atem had let the clasp fall into place, Set let his smirk widen to a smile. He held his hands up, facing outwards from the balcony towards the horizon, beyond the city below. It was only now Yami realized it looked different…

The buildings that had once stood tall before were charred at the tops, as though a fiery breath had scorched them. Some buildings were flattened, or just gone. There were huge gashes in the cityscape—scars of destruction only disaster could make. No one was in the streets.

Had the _demon_ done all this…?

* * *

The room was small, built as the rest of the place was; with stone blocks packed so tightly together that you couldn't fit a nail file between them. What was different was what was in the center of the room.

There was a shallow pool built into the floor, filled with a silvery, shimmery, eerie liquid that seemed to ripple on its own. And there, floating facedown in the middle of it, was—

"Yami!"

Yugi ran to the edge of the pool and stopped, hesitant.

"Ah," Atemu said heavily, coming up behind him. "I have feeling he is here."

"What _is_ this?" Yugi asked, eyeing the strange substance before him. It reminded him of mercury…only it was sticky looking; it clung in threads to Yami's hair and clothes, as though it were enveloping him…

"It is memory pool."

"…what's that?"

"What it is saying, Yugi. It is pool full of memory. See?"

Atemu knelt on the small ledge next to the pool, and held his hand over the liquid; a thin, gooey thread rose out of the water, reluctant to part from the others.

"This is what memory is looking like when it is out of mind."

Yugi looked back at Yami's floating body.

"So _that's_ how he was seeing your memories..."

The pharaoh nodded.

"He is seeing me receiving necklace. Receive curse."

His eyes were sad again.

"…So should we get him out?" Yugi asked.

Atemu blinked, and shook his head.

"Yes," he said distantly, letting the memory fall back into the pool and getting up again, "He is staying too long…"

* * *

An explosion of sound met their ears, making Yami double over; it was like that sound wave when the demon had first come—except now it was followed by that horrible shrieking. Hands still over his ears, Yami opened his eyes again, and saw that the pharaoh was facing the demon now, hands clenched, jaw set. Reluctantly, he closed his eyes.

That strange blue light was emanating from Set again—except this time he had a staff in his hand, amplifying the effect. It was a long, golden rod, with a ball at the end that had that same eye engraved on it. Yami wondered just how many times he was going to see that eye while he was here…wherever here was…

The light shot out at the demon, trapping it in that white-blue light. The demon screeched again, startled, writhing like a wild animal, slowly figuring just how stuck they were. It got more panicked as Set somehow pulled it closer to the balcony, struggling in the energy to no avail. Yami pressed his hands more firmly against his hears; the noise was excruciating. The demon looked genuinely scared now; its roars were becoming more and more desperate, and panicked.

Yami knew what happened next; he remembered it from the story of the necklace, told to him a thousand times over by his dad. Now that he was seeing it, thought, he felt as if he were learning the whole thing all over again. He cringed when, with one last burst of energy, the whole balcony erupted with light, turning from blue to white to red, and haunting screams mixed with the roar of a thousand winds. The light focused on the middle of the pharaoh's chest, lost in a chilling brightness comparable to the hot desert sun—

And then it was gone. As soon as it came, everything was gone. The sun, the ruined city, the balcony, and the people on the balcony slowly faded into Yami's vision again, his eyes adjusting to the sudden change. When everything around him didn't look so dark, Yami saw that the pharaoh was standing on the edge, holding onto the stone railing for dear life.

He looked like he'd seen his own death; every muscle in his body was shaking, he was sweating feverishly, his breath staggered, irregular…but the worst part of it was his eyes. They were wide, unfocused, and utterly terrified.

Yami felt a pang of sympathy; he woke up from nightmares like that, sometimes.

Except the pharaoh wasn't having a nightmare.

Set, who looked completely unaffected, came up beside the pharaoh and clapped him on the back. Atem lurched forward, looking as though he were going to puke. He yelled something at Set in a strangled voice. Set laughed a loud, cold laugh in response.

Yami clenched his fists; he knew he couldn't change what he saw, but it didn't change how much he wanted to just hit Set across the face right now…he knew damn well what he did, but he still gloated like it was a bet Atem had lost. Like this was some game.

Atem wasn't moving from his spot on the railing, where he was practically folded over it. He looked like he was trying to get up, but his muscles just quivered violently every time he tried to use them, and despite his weak efforts, he looked like he was starting to slip the wrong way—

Yami stepped forward without thinking, reaching his hand out to grab the pharaoh's shoulder, or arm, or something to keep him from falling—he could see the pharaoh slipping further and further down the wrong side, and his muscles became lax; he'd fainted.

"Wait! _No!"_ Yami yelled, grabbing for his ancestor's shoulder—

Only to have his hand go right through it.

"_Dammit!_" Yami hissed, trying again, no quite sure why he was trying to stop an illusion—

"_Yami!" _

Yami shook his head; it was nice that he was starting to hear his name now, really. He grabbed at the pharaoh's shoulder again, as he had slipped a little further—a small part of his brain told him it wasn't going to work, but he shoved it away, desperate not to let the pharaoh fall to his death—

"_YAMI!"_

The voice was louder, more defined.

"_No!"_ Yami said again, watching him slip even further—

SLAM.

Yami saw Set's hand come into his peripheral vision and hit the pharaoh's back in just the wrong spot to send his former friend over the edge completely.

"ATEM!"

* * *

Atemu walked around to the side of the pool closest to Yami's head. Yugi followed on the other side, thinking they were going to try and pull him out. But when Atemu didn't kneel down next to Yami's outstretched hand, Yugi paused. He had a thoughtful expression.

"I am thinking," he said, "It will be better if he come out on his own."

"…How's he going to do that?"

Atemu waved a finger at Yugi, and then down at Yami, saying, "You call him."

Yugi raised an eyebrow.

"He know your voice," he explained.

Yugi nodded; made enough sense. Carefully, he knelt down on the pool's ledge and leaned out as far as he could out towards Yami's ear, cupped his hand, and yelled as loud as he could,

"_YAMI!"_

At first, nothing seemed to happen. Yugi pulled himself back to a safe spot next to the pool, instead of over it. Atemu sighed.

"He is here long time, I think—"  
"Whoa!" Yugi exclaimed, jumping back; Yami's head had suddenly snapped to the side. He would have been looking right at Yugi—if it hadn't been for the layer of moving memories covering his face completely.

"Ah," Atemu said calmly, when he reached Yugi's side, "He is hearing us. This is good sign. He will come out now. You call to him again."

Yugi watched, bug-eyed as Yami turned his head again as though he were looking for something, face dripping with silvery goo…

* * *

Yami threw himself on the railing and watched as his white robes fluttered further and further away.

Behind him, Set turned, and walked away.

"_Yami!"_ Someone called, _"Answer me!"_

"Who's there?!" Yami yelled, looking around the balcony, "Where are you!?"

"I'm—"

He didn't hear the rest of the sentence, for something grabbed at the back of his jacket and pulled him backwards.

"AGH!"

Everything started to swirl together very fast—much faster than they had been before—he heard a roaring in his ears, and he felt like he was getting sucked through a vacuum. The gray nothingness that had come and gone between visions before was pressing in on him now, flying past him with immense speed, until Yami felt like he was going to be sick—

SMACK.

He landed on his side on a hard surface, knocking the wind out of him. He coughed and spluttered, gasping for air, completely disoriented.

"Yami!"

Yami couldn't respond; all he could do was cough…

"This is very good," another voice said calmly, "We catch him before he suffocate."

"He was going to suffocate?"

"There is no air in memory pool," the new voice said, "even soul cannot live without air, if it is thinking it is still in body."

"…Oh."

Yami's coughing had subsided somewhat, and he felt like he could breathe again. He felt a hand on the middle of his chest.

"I am drying you now."

He tried to ask what the hell they were talking about, but his voice was still not working. So when he started to feel warm, and dry, all he could do was gasp.

Then, suddenly, Yami felt…free. His breathing calmed, became steady, and he felt the hysteria from the last vision fade away.

"There," the voice said.

Slowly, Yami opened his eyes.

He was laying on a brick floor, next to someone's knees. He looked up.

"…Yugi?"

Wide, purple eyes nodded.

Slowly, Yami pushed himself up. He felt very lethargic.

"Where…where are we?"

"Something to do with a mind and heart," Yugi replied flatly. "I think it has something to do with his consciousness." He nodded to a spot behind Yami.

Yami turned around to see who 'he' was—

And saw a pair or reddish, mahogany eyes staring back at him.

* * *

A/N: Three guesses as to which famous book series the memory pool idea came from, and the first two don't count!

Hope you had fun, guys! Lots of stuff going on! Yay!


	37. Another Ghost

A/N: I keep waking up in odd hours of the morning and finding myself sitting at the computer, writing this chapter. I think this means I'm excited to get this part down on cyber-paper.

On another note, the answer to last chapter's question is the pensive from HP indeed. That was just such a cool concept, I had to use it somewhere.

Chapter Thirty-Seven: Another Ghost

* * *

"You…" Yami lifted a finger and pointed at the man before him.

The red eyes flickered for a minute, as he blinked.

"What?" he asked. His voice was much different from what it sounded like before; calm, benign…old. It made Yami doubt his assumption that this was the man he'd seen in the visions. But he looked exactly the same, so it _had _to be him…right?

"You're not…dead…" He managed to say—although as he was saying it, he realized just how stupid he sounded…

Nonetheless, the man nodded.

"No, I am not dead," he said, "I have curse, I cannot die until is broken. You are not seeing things as they happen, a minute ago. You are seeing my memory, Yami. From when I am living, three thousand year ago."

There was a pause, as Yami let the sentence sink into his brain.

"How…was I doing that?" he asked tentatively.

"You were drowning in a memory pool," Yugi said. Yami turned to look at him.

"A _what_?"

Yugi nodded to the floor behind him.

"That's what Atemu called it."

Yami looked past Yugi's shoulder.

"What the…?" he shied away from the silvery mass, as though it were going to jump at him.

"That's what memories look like when they're not in your head," Yugi said, glancing at the pool. "They were all over your face."

Yami suppressed a shiver. That explained a few things…somewhat…

"So you are feeling better, yes?"

Yami turned to Atemu, Yugi called him. Set had called him 'Temu, a few minutes ago...

"Where are we?" he asked again; he hadn't really understood Yugi's answer; something about brains and hearts…

"It is as Yugi say," Atemu said, nodding in Yugi's direction. _Great_, Yami thought.

"It is place made of mind and heart," Atemu continued, "That is how we find you; we think of you. We see my memory, and it lead us here—"

"Hold on."

Atemu tilted his head.

"Yes?" he asked politely.

"You're…I can understand you now…"

He nodded.

"I learn your language," he said simply, "By hearing you. And Amir, before you. It is very hard language—lot of sound I cannot make."

His forehead crinkled in a light frown as he talked, as though it were a small disappointment that he would have liked to fix, but wasn't necessary. Then, his face cleared.

"But I learn."

He caught sight of Yami's bewildered stare.

"I am not as I am in memory. That is what you are thinking."

Yami blinked.

"How did you—"

"I see many face, many lives. I know what face is saying."

"…oh."

There was a silence. Yami felt oddly powerless around Atemu, friendly as he seemed. He thought back to the visions—or rather, memories—he'd just seen. That pharaoh was young, strong, stubborn, and proud. He raged like a wildfire, throwing himself hastily into dangers unimaginable to protect his country, his people—like a mother whose child had been put in danger.

Now, though…he was standing before Yami, suspended in some strange mind-world, tamed from three thousand years of imprisonment, talking to him as though he'd invited Yami over to chat.

Yami couldn't think of anything to say to describe the awkward awe that was growing inside of him…

* * *

As Anzu made her way back to the edge of the field, she found herself getting more and more confused. She knew they'd fought the demon; she'd seen it with her own two eyes. Kaiba had gotten himself covered in blood because he'd stabbed the demon in the back of the head. She had gouged one of its eyes out, before Yugi had figured out it was blind in the first place.

She stopped on the edge of the track, next to where Kaiba was standing, staring out at the black night with that blank stare again.

"So what are we going to say when they get here?" she asked again.

"We found them," Kaiba said, "We thought they were knocked out. That's why we stayed here so long. We called them because we couldn't find a pulse, and they were getting cold. And they're classmates of ours."

Slowly, Anzu nodded. A story so close to the truth it was easy to tell. That would work…

"Yami's parents are going to blame you," Bakura said. Anzu realized he was talking to Kaiba.

"I know," Kaiba said. He turned away from the night, not meeting anyone's eyes.

"…What're you going to do about it?" Bakura pressed.

Kaiba bent over, and picked up the head of the staff, which was somehow clean now. Just like Kaiba's clothes, Anzu noticed.

"What's there to do?" He asked quietly. He turned and walked down the edge of the field. Anzu realized he was retrieving the staff's handle from where the demon had knocked it off.

Anzu and Bakura exchanged glances.

"Does he always act like this?" Bakura asked.

Anzu shrugged.

"I've only seen him in class, but he's usually very helpful. I was surprised when Yami told me about what had happened before—"

"So you know about that, too?" Bakura asked. It was more of a statement than a question.

"Yes," Anzu said heavily, "I know about that too."

She didn't ask what version of the story Yami had told him; she didn't want to split hairs like that right now.

If anything, she felt like they were waiting for a bomb to detonate—waiting for the atmosphere to erupt in yelling, and sirens…

and fear.

* * *

"Nifty."

Yami turned to see that Yugi was leaning over the edge of the pool, watching the silvery liquid intensely.  
"If you look, you can see the memories from here—"

"Eh, get away from there! You fall!"

"I can balance," Yugi said simply.

"You waste time!" Atemu said, walking swiftly over to where Yugi was leaning. Yami could see faint shadows of that wild anger flaring in his eyes again, "You need to get back to body, and you sit here and watch memory!"

Yugi pointed to a spot in the pool.

"I think I see Yami here—Gyack!"

Atemu grabbed the back of Yugi's shirt, and with one swift, quick movement, had yanked him off the pool's edge and into a standing position.

"You waste time," Atemu said again, "You need to go back to real world."

"How?" Yugi asked. Atemu let go of his shirt. He was still glaring.

"Curse need to break."

"And how am I going to do anything about that? Isn't that Yami's job?"

"Yes, but you help."

"Again?!"

"You help until it is done!" Atemu exclaimed, waving his hands; it seemed he was resisting the urge to slap Yugi, from where Yami was sitting.

"All right, so what happens _now_?" Yugi snapped back, waving his hands like Atemu.

"You find rest of demon outside," Atemu said, "And bring him here."

Yugi frowned.

"The _rest_ of? I thought it got killed—"

"Most of it killed," Atemu said, "Not all. Last part is part is born from."

Yugi paused to process what Atemu's fragmented sentence meant.

"You're saying whatever made it is still alive?"

Atemu nodded.

_Wait a minute…_

Yami straightened.

"It was _made_?"

* * *

When she heard the sirens come closer and stop, Anzu felt a cold knot form in her stomach. She heard car doors slamming, and footsteps coming around the side of the school. She watched, as the medics found Yami and Yugi, and started to check for different things, asking questions. She answered everything perfectly, according to Kaiba's story. Neither Kaiba nor Bakura said anything the entire time, except to agree with what Anzu told them. They put blankets over Yami and Yugi both . They gave Bakura a blanket because he was so cold.

They even detected a pulse; it was just so faint that it was barely noticeable. The knot in Anzu's stomach started to loosen, after that—

Until they determined that Yami and Yugi were in a coma.

That was about the time when Yami's parents arrived. And grandparents, Anzu realized, when they'd gotten out of the car parked haphazardly down the street…

* * *

"Yes," Atemu said, waving a hand, "You get it wrong, when you write down curse story. Whoever write it have something in ear, I think."

Yami's eyes widened.

"…What's the…_real_ story…then?" he asked hesitantly.

"You see it," Atemu said, turning to Yami, "I see you seeing it."

Yami looked at the memory pool, thinking…

In the very first memory he'd heard a crash in the desert, and he'd seen the demon fly overhead, screeching as it went…

And then he'd noticed someone next to him, watching it go.

Yami gasped.

"_Set!"_ he exclaimed.

* * *

Anzu turned away, as one of the medics told Yami's parents what had happened. She didn't want to see their reaction; she suddenly felt like it was hard to hold herself together. It was as if Yami's parents being there just made everything that had happened that much more real, and gravid.

A coma…

That'd mean he could spend years in a hospital, sleeping his life away—

Anzu blinked. At first she thought it was because she was fighting back the wetness that was trying to fall out of her eyes—but then she realized that she'd seen something again. It had been something subtle, a shadow in the dark, a movement just large enough to be noticed by the human eye.

Anzu shivered; she needed sleep...

* * *

Atemu nodded solemnly.

"Yes," he said, "demon is made from Set."

He suddenly seemed very old and weary, as though three thousand years had suddenly caught up to him. He sat down on the edge of the pool, saying,

"My friend is full of hate of me, after war. He think I kill my people with no thinking. I do not know how to be leader in war. This is true then. Many people are suffering, because of this. But he do what I say, because I am god in human form. This is what we think. He start to not believe I am god, inside. He know me since I am young. He think I am too human to be god. He then think people are living in lie. He start to hate me more. He fill up with hate.

He also have very powerful magic. He is best there is, and this is why he become high priest. He is powerful before he learn magic, and he more powerful after, but…he can not control."

Atemu shook his head.

"It take him over. I do not notice; I am making Egypt better again, rebuild, I think is word. He think of revenge for me. Now, it is his hate that make him decide what to do. His power help him feel, too. That is how demon is made."

Yami sat where he was, stunned. All this time, he was thinking it came from some other ungodly place…although now that he thought about it, pulling a demon from another dimension didn't really make that much sense…not that he'd ever thought the curse was _supposed_ to make sense…

It seemed, though, that there was a method to the madness.

* * *

"Anzu."

Anzu jumped; she realized she'd been staring at the grass where she'd seen that movement. Kaiba was looking at her, now. The medics weren't on the field, anymore. Anzu looked at where they were parked on the curb; they were putting Yami in one of the two ambulances they'd brought with them.

"Bakura offered to take us to the emergency room. He could drive you."

Anzu looked back at Kaiba.

"They're in a coma," she said mechanically, "how is waiting there going to do anything?"

"They're almost dead," Kaiba said. "If they last through the rest of the night, they should recover."

"What about you?"

Icy blue eyes flickered to Anzu's, and then away again.

"What _about_ me?"

"Have Yami's parents said anything to you?"

Slowly, Kaiba shook his head.

"They can't say anything in front of them," he said, eyes flicking towards the ambulances, "But they want to."

"…What'll they say?"

"Why does it matter?"

Anzu sighed.

"I don't know…" She said. She felt helpless.

She didn't like that feeling.

"I'll come," She blurted out. She pulled out her cellphone to leave a message at home for her parents; they weren't going to come back until early morning from a business trip, and she didn't know how long 'though the night' actually meant…

* * *

"So when we killed the demon," Yugi said, "we killed its physical being. But its core…is Set himself?"

Atemu nodded.

"Yes," he said, "You understand. When Set bring demon to life, he lose himself in it. What is left in life is anger. Madness, in end."

"So he went insane?" Yami guessed.

"Yes," Atemu said.

"And now his soul is floating around outside?" Yugi guessed.

Atemu nodded again.

"….and I have to find him?"

"It will not be hard," Atemu said, looking up at Yugi, "he is waiting for someone to find. He do not know what happen, after life in body is ending. This is what I am thinking."

Yugi glanced around the room.

"I hope so," he said. Then, after another confusing moment of his scouring the brick walls around them, he asked,

"How do I get out of here?"

* * *

Anzu didn't remember much of the ride to the emergency room; only the streets stretched out ahead of them, and the buildings of Domino flashing by the window. And the cold.

She'd doubted that Bakura would be thawed enough to hold a steering wheel, but he ended up shoving the keys into his car in the then desolate parking lot, unlocking doors for her and Kaiba with a strained, worn expression, and telling them to hurry and get in. They had, and he'd rather jerkily gotten his car to move out of the parking space and into motion. Anzu didn't want to know how much attention he was giving to driving, right now.

"He'd _better_ be okay," Bakura muttered. Anzu looked over to see he was crying again.

She closed her eyes. She really didn't want to break down—not now…

"Just drive," she snapped.

Bakura wiped his eyes.

"Working on it," he said glumly.

They were silent for the rest of the drive. Kaiba didn't say anything at all.

* * *

"You get out of here the same way we find Yami," Atemu replied. "Can you not find door without me?"

Suddenly Yugi jumped to the side a little, and scrutinized the spot he was just at.

"Did you just do that?"

The pharaoh laughed weakly.

"I have practice thinking of way out," he said, "even if I cannot go through or see door anymore, I can still think of way out."

"You can't see this?"

"See what?" Yami asked, looking between them, "What're you guys talking about?"

"I will tell later," Atemu said, reaching over and patting Yami's shoulder. Then, he said to Yugi, "You will see him as ghost, like me."

Yugi didn't say anything; he didn't look too convinced that this was going to work. Still, he reached out ahead of him and wrapped his hand around thin air.

"I'll try to come back," he said flatly, pulling whatever he was holding onto—

And then he walked out of sight.

Yami gave his head a shake.

"…Where did he go?"

"Back to real world," Atemu said, "He will come back soon."

"…How do you know?"

Atemu's small smile widened.

"I am having feeling that my living is ending soon," he said warmly. "This is how I am knowing."

He turned to Yami, who could feel the weirded out expression across his face.

"Oh, you are thinking I am crazy too?" he asked, laughing and grabbing Yami's shoulder again, shaking it. Yami let out the breath he didn't know he was holding.

"You're talking about death like it's Christmas," he said, fighting back the urge to let out a laugh—he ended up clearing his throat instead.

"You are not living for three thousand years," Atemu replied, waving his finger at Yami.

Yami nodded; seemed fair enough. He felt like he was talking to an uncle he hadn't seen since he was too young to remember.

"Ah, but now I am wasting time," Atemu said, waving his hand again, "I yell at Yugi and now I am doing same thing. I am wanting to tell you some things before curse break."

"Like what?" Yami asked.

The pharaoh's eyes narrowed in thought, and he didn't say anything for a long moment. Then, he looked behind him at the pool. He held his hand over it.

"I think this help you understand what curse is," he said, "because it is long time since it happen. What it is made of, family forget."

As he spoke, his hand started to glow a faint white, and the silvery mass beneath it started to shift, and swirl. Then, a couple strands shot up and stuck to the pharaoh's hand, as though they were using it to pull themselves out. More strands came up, slithering around his fingers, until his hand was covered in writhing memories. Then, he gave his hand a firm shake—all the memories fell off again, and just before they hit the pool, Atem's hand had caught them and molded them into a sphere, swirling just millimeters above his glowing palm.

He held it out to Yami.

"Put hand over," he said, putting his own hand where he wanted Yami to hold his.

Tentatively Yami complied, wary of what he was going to see next…

He saw a memory shoot out of the sphere suddenly, and slither onto Yami's hand. Yami looked at it for a moment, startled by how alive it seemed—

And then his vision clouded, as though he'd closed his eyes was starting to dream…

* * *

He didn't see Bakura as he came in, but he could hear him. For a while he just stood there, presumably considering the person sitting before him, hunched over in his desk. He wished the little twerp would just go away—

"He'll miss you," he said.

Kaiba turned to Bakura. His expression was unreadable.

"It may not seem like it," Bakura continued, looking Kaiba dead in the eye with those creepy gray eyes, "but you were friends. He'll miss you."

Kaiba felt something inside him snap—he realized he couldn't stay here any longer. He had to get out. He had to leave. Now.

There was a scraping of a chair, as Kaiba stood up suddenly. He turned to Bakura, who just looked back up at Kaiba, unruffled. For a long moment they stood like that, oblivious to the morning middle school sounds floating around them.

"Let him," was all Kaiba could manage.

…And before Bakura could even respond, Kaiba turned and walked his stately pace out of the room.

All that could be heard were the click of expensive black shoes and a clunk, as the front door to Dalton High School closed for the final time on Kaiba.

He never once looked back. It made it easier keep walking...

* * *

The cloudiness faded, and the brick room blurred back into view. Yami rubbed his eyes with the hand that wasn't holding the memory.

"That is easier than being in pool, yes?"

Yami gave his head a shake; he seemed to be doing that a lot in here…wherever here was…

"That was…I was…in Kaiba's _head_?"

"In his head in memory," Atem corrected, "There are many way to see memory. This way will be better than living in them like you do before."

"Why are you showing me Kaiba's memories?" Yami asked, putting his hand over the memory pool. The thread on his fingers slithered towards the rest of them. "What does this have to do with breaking the curse?"

"See more," Atemu said, "You will understand."

Yami felt extremely awkward, now; he felt like he was going through Kaiba's room and looking through all his personal things.

"Why _Kaiba's_, though?" Yami pressed. He eyed the sphere in Atemu's hand. How many of them _were_ there…?

"He is only one that figure out what I want to show you," Atemu replied patiently, "It is hard, yes—but you are needing to understand clear, why he is how he is. If you do not see, you never know. You have to know this."

Yami made a face, but he held his hand out again nonetheless. He later figured it was out of morbid curiosity more than anything—because deep down, he really did want to understand what had happened to Kaiba…how had the curse affected him?

It couldn't be nearly as bad as what Yami had been through, could it?

* * *

A/N: I believe this chapter could be seen as the scenery the next one's going to act on.

Hehe.


	38. Apathy

A/N: I was going to post this sooner, but life got in the way again. I really need to work on that… I should get a flyswatter.

I've been waiting to write this chapter for a very, very long time. Hehehe…

Chapter thirty-eight: Apathy

* * *

"I'll try to come back," Yugi said, eying the large white door before him. He found it strange that this one was actually visible outside of his mind—but maybe the pharaoh was just that good at opening these things.

Yugi put his hand around the knob and pulled, revealing a lot of white light that he couldn't see through, at first. As he waited for his eyes to adjust, a strong smell of….clean hit him. With a faint scent of plastic. Confused, reached blindly behind him to shut the door again. It closed with a soft click.

After a few moments, Yugi saw he was standing in a white room, with large white and blue tiles on the floor. Fluorescent lights hung above him, suspended from a white tile ceiling. There was a large reception desk to his left, with two bored-looking people behind it; a guy that looked like he'd been there too long, and a woman who very well might have been a statue, if it weren't for the fact that she blinked slowly every so often. On the front of the desk were the words,

DOMINO HOSPITAL

Yugi stared at the words for a moment, wondering what he was doing _here_, of all places. Not that it really mattered; if he was led here, Set's ghost must be floating around somewhere close by…

He found he had options as to where to start looking; there were two hallways on his side of the desk, and two halls on the other side. They all had blue words painted on the walls next to arrows pointing to different wings of the building, but none of them really indicated which one a ghost would be floating around in.

Although after some thought, Yugi supposed that if a ghost would be anywhere in a hospital, it'd be in an emergency room. Confused, sudden death happened there, and some may not have been ready to die…Maybe Set's ghost had found a friend.

Yugi sighed, and started walking. He was surprised the reception people hadn't stopped him and asked him what he was doing here…after all, it looked like he'd just stepped out of a supply closet…

* * *

"_You have to know this."_

Those were the only words running through Yami's mind as the next memory faded into view…

He was suddenly in the middle of chaos. Everyone was talking in rushed voices, shooting phrases he barely recognized, running back and forth. Tubes were running through skin, blood was everywhere, things were beeping and flashing, and the smell was so horrible he felt sick to his stomach, and he held it, trying to keep from vomiting on the sterile, white floor. He still tried to see. He tried to push through the white coats just to see him—he'd already fought through the grip of the other grown-ups just outside the door, and now he was trying to fight through these ones too—he was told to be quiet; he must have been shouting, or screaming, or something, he didn't even know—all he knew is that he wanted, needed to be there, right there, right next to him—He finally got through—

Time stopped.

There were the strands of familiar black hair, all clumped together by masses of fluids that should never be seen where they were that night. Bleary eyes, halfway open, stared out, the life leaking from them with every passing moment. Only because Seto was standing there did the sparkle of life in those large, too young eyes trickle away as slowly as it did.

But in the end, it still stuttered out.

In the end, Seto was staring at the flat line of the heart monitor next to him, trying to believe that his younger brother's hand wasn't limp, and fast becoming less warm.

"_MOKUBAAAAA!"_

He was in a cold sweat, breathing quickly, and heavily. He looked down; his blankets and sheets were thrown off the bed, scattered around his room. His pillow was near the door. He must have thrown it again.

His face was hot, his eyes swimming; he was crying. Kaiba stayed still, waiting for his breath to become even again, for his mind to come back to reality. He looked at the clock; it was two in the morning. He'd fallen asleep in his clothes. again.

He tried to ignore the aching pain deep in his chest, almost crippling him it was so strong. He knew it wasn't true, but he felt like his heart was bruised, and throbbing.

He shook his head, furiously wiping off the sweat and tears with a clammy hand.

"shit…"

This was why he hated crying; he only did it in his sleep, but he always woke up like this. He was a complete mess, and he always felt like shit the next morning. He could never get back to sleep, after remembering something like this in a dream…

The edges around his vision blurred…

Yami became aware of himself again, sitting on the edge of the memory pool, with the pharaoh sitting next to him.

He was shaking.

He looked down at the memory in his hand, balled up into a sphere. Instinctively, he flung it off his hand and back into the pool, as though it were poisoning him. He wrapped his arms around his middle; _he_ felt sick, now…

"Why did I have to _see_ that?!" he yelled, turning the pharaoh. His voice was loud, and angry.

However, the pharaoh didn't seem perturbed at all.

"You will see," he said. He held out his hand again. The ball in it was considerably smaller.

Yami shook his head. His stomach was churning, now.

"I don't want to see anymore," he said, "I don't know if I can handle any more…I _met_ Mokuba! I didn't need to see him die like that! What does that have to do with the curse anyway?!"

"Seto see him die," Atemu said heavily, "he is younger than you when he see."

"Yeah, he was in middle school! What does that have to do with anyth—"

"If you see next memory, you see why I show you this one," Atemu interrupted smoothly.

Yami looked at the sphere of memories in the pharaoh's hand for a long moment. The sickness in his stomach started to ebb away. Slowly, he relaxed his hand from the fist it was in, and forced it in the direction of the memories again.

"If I throw up…"

* * *

Yugi found it was a short hallway, which was good. He'd never been here before, in all his time in Domino. His grandpa had, but Yugi had always waited for him in the library.

The hallway opened out into a waiting room, with another door on Yugi's right, and another smaller desk on Yugi's left. Directly ahead was a line of chairs along the waiting room wall. Half of them were taken at the moment—some of them with people Yugi knew.

In the corner were four people he didn't recognize, but the younger two looked an awful lot like Yami—Yugi figured it was safe to assume those were his parents. Next was Anzu, then Yami's strange friend from Dalton…last was Kaiba, sitting a few seats over from everyone else. He was the only one that was looking up at the moment; the rest of them were fiddling with things, or sitting still as anything, looking worried.

Yugi raised a hand and waved—just to check…

Kaiba didn't move. No one else caught the movement out of their peripheral, even though all of them could.

…Unless they couldn't see him, which Yugi was pretty convinced was the case, now. Which also meant his body was lying somewhere without its soul, just like Yami's.

Which meant…

Yugi looked towards the royal blue double doors that led past the waiting room.

Was _his_ body down there…? Did he have to get back to it to do anything? No…the pharaoh had done plenty without his body, presumably mummified somewhere in Egypt. Or stuck in a museum, somewhere. Yugi almost laughed at the thought that he could walk into an exhibit someday and run into him under a glass case.

He shook his head instead, and looked around the room again. He needed to figure out where to look…he ventured closer to where everyone was sitting, walking past the smaller reception desk and the automatic doors, which didn't open when he walked on the mat in front of them.

It was only when he got closer did Yugi's eyes catch something pale and human-shaped in his line of vision. Quickly, he turned to look—

There he was. He was sitting in the waiting room chair next to Kaiba, wearing white robes and sandals, just like Atemu. That must have been what they dressed their dead in. Except Set didn't have all the adornments Atemu did, but Yugi assumed that was because Atemu was the pharaoh.

He had his head turned towards Kaiba, and would have been looking directly at him—but his eyes were clumsily gouged out, leaving irregular messy holes in his eye sockets, caked with dried, gray blood. There was another wide hole in the base of his head, Yugi saw; it looked like it had broken through his skull and into his brain. His left arm was sticking out at an odd angle; it was broken.

For a moment Yugi stood there, letting the gruesome sight send shivers up and down his spine; he knew that if he'd seen Set's ghost in his nightmares, he wouldn't be able to sleep properly for weeks afterward…

Still, he needed to somehow bring Set back to where Atemu was…

But how was he going to do that when Set wouldn't—couldn't—even look at him?

* * *

"Seto."

Yami found himself looking up, as the image faded into a small, nicely furnished room. Papers were everywhere, and books were packed into the bookshelf behind the desk where his father was sitting. Light was coming through the small open window on the right.

"Do you know why I brought you in here, and not your little brother?"

"Because I'm older?" Seto guessed.

Father laughed.

"No, that's not the _only_ reason," he said, smiling at Seto, "I wanted to tell you something. I don't want you to tell Mokuba, because he's still too young. I'll tell him when he's ready to hear it."

Seto straightened. So this was something _really_ big…

Seto's father put his hands together on the desk and leaned on his elbows, looking down at Seto as he would his employees; Seto had seen him do it at work numerous times on those 'bring your kid to work' days.

"Do you believe in curses, Seto?"

Seto thought for a moment.

"You mean like bad words?"

Father shook his head.

"No," he said, "I mean as in real curses. Magic curses."

Seto frowned. He hadn't been expecting that.

"…Oh."

"Oh?" Father repeated.

Seto shifted in his seat.  
"I think so," he said, "I've heard you and Uncle Gozaburo talking about them…"

Father nodded.

"Yes," he said, "we have. He doesn't believe in them. I do."

"He said you're crazy."

"….Do _you_ think I'm crazy?"

"No."

"….You sure about that?"

A pause. Seto didn't look up, as he said,

"How can something like that be real? There's no way it could be real. Things like that don't exist."

"And how do you know they don't exist?"

Seto shook his head.

"They just don't."

"Well," Father said, "What if I were to say _we_ were cursed?"

"…What?"

Father nodded. His expression was serious.

"You've learned about ancient Egypt, right?"

Seto tried to think back to that part of history class.

"Yeah," he said, "they had pharaohs, and gods, and all that."

"They also had the ability to create horrendous curses," Father said.

Seto was all ears now.

"Seriously?"

Father nodded.

"They wanted to keep their dead pharaohs safe, so they created curses to keep people away from them."

"Whoa…" Seto said; he thought that was kind of cool…

Father held up a finger.

"But there's _one _case," he said, "where someone used a curse on a living being. He created a being—a demon—that continually punished the man it was cursed on until he died. Then it punished him in death, as well; the only way he could free himself from it is if he or one of his family broke the curse."

Seto didn't have anything to say to that.

"In addition to _that_," Father continued, "The necklace the demon was sealed in was forced to be passed on to the man's daughter when she was a child, who then wore it for her whole life, and so on."

"…He didn't like that guy very much, did he?"

"No, not very," Father agreed.

A silence.

"So…are you saying he's still around?" Seto guessed, trying to see where this conversation was going. "The cursed guy?"

Father's face fell at that, and he sighed.

"Yes," he said, "As is the demon."

Seto glanced around the room; he knew his father kept a lot of old things in here…

"The necklace that carries the curse is still being worn by the man's family," Father said, "It's not here."

"Oh, okay," Seto said, letting out the breath he didn't know he was holding.

"The curse's creator's family is still around, too," Father said.

Seto looked up.

"Who are the—"

"Us, Seto."

Seto froze. He hadn't been expecting that. He _really_ hadn't been expecting that….

Father looked away, and started to mindlessly straighten papers on his desk.

"The demon still uses our feelings—all of ours—to use against that family. Have you ever suddenly felt angry, for no real reason?"

Seto didn't have to think for long.

"Yeah," he said solemnly, "Like when I was eating breakfast yesterday and my spoon dropped."

Father nodded.

"Exactly like that," he said, "That wasn't _you_ that tried to destroy the kitchen. You don't even remember that part, right?"

Seto solemnly shook his head. A part of him still didn't believe that had happened, even though they'd shown him the iron pan he'd bent.

"That, Seto," Father said, "is the power of the demon."

Seto didn't respond for a long moment, piecing it together. The more he thought about it, the more it impossibly made sense…

"So like Uncle Gozaburo all the time," he said, "he doesn't remember anything. And he's always angry."

"Yes," father said heavily, "like that."

"Does he know?"

"He hasn't been listening for years," Father said, "he never did. Honestly, I think he's beyond any point of return, now."

Seto was silent. Then, slowly, he forced out a fear that had been bothering him for a long, long time.

"Are…are we going to—end up like that—?"

Seto watched, as his father got up from the desk, walked around it, and knelt in front of him. He put his hands on Seto's shoulders and looked him directly in the eye, as he said,

"Not if you fight, Seto. You _can_ fight this. It may very very hard, but you _can_ control your feelings. If you train yourself to never give in to that urge, the demon won't have anything to rely on anymore."

"What'll that do?"

"It will weaken it, and eventually kill it. Then, you'll never have to feel it again. It will be a very long process; you may die before you reach the end. But if you succeed…you nor anyone else will have to feel it again."

Seto looked directly into his father's eyes.

"Then I'll fight," he said. It was an easy decision, even though twinges of doubt were still floating in his mind about the reality of an ancient Egyptian curse…if resisting worked, Seto decided, he'd believe.

There was a knock on the door.

"Who is it?"

"Mokuba!"

"All right, go get your jacket on, I'll be right there," Father called.

"Okay!"

They both heard Mokuba's clumsy, eight-year-old footsteps running down the hallway.

"I'm going to drop Mokuba off, at his friend's house," Father said, standing, "Remember what I said, and _don't tell your brother_."

Seto gave a quick nod.

"Right," he said.

The image blurred as Seto's father left the room, and Yami found himself staring at brick again. Seto's father's words pierced Yami's mind like a hot needle, acute and harsh.

"The demon…" he said, "It…fed off of feelings, I knew that…but only _their_ feelings?"

"I think is because Set is make curse so strong," Atemu said, nodding, "That demon use Set himself to become whole being. Set lose soul to demon, and feeling he feel when he create demon…this is what demon know as part of itself—"

"So in order to stay alive, it needed those feelings as a part of it? From the Kaiba family?" Yami guessed.

"Yes," the pharaoh said. He gave Yami a small smile.

"Now do you see why I show you vision before? It is after this, same night, that Seto is seeing brother die. This is what make him believe in curse. This is also what make him want to fight; he doesn't want to lose anyone else. When he see your necklace first time…when you ask him what is wrong…he is not person that is responding. He remember later—but he is not in control."

Yami looked at the floor again, letting the fact sink in.

"So when he threatened me with unleashing the curse…he didn't know what he was saying…"

"Yes," he hear the pharaoh say.

Yami felt his hands clench. That meant…

"Kaiba told his dad he'd fight the demon," Yami said, thinking aloud, "so did that mean…he was going to stop giving in to anger…?"

Spoken aloud, the idea sounded silly.

But Atemu nodded.

"He try to feel apathy," he said. "Apathy will not help demon. Demon force hate between family. This is why curse not broken for so long; both side have something the other need, but demon keep them apart."

Which meant…that time before homeroom, when Kaiba was telling him about the witness part of the curse…He'd noticed how abrupt Kaiba was, even then…

He was witnessing a battle. A battle Kaiba had been having with himself for years.

It was his life. Ever since his father and brother died, ever since he left Dalton...

"Yami?"

Yami turned a stunned stare to Atemu.

"That means…that Seto…This entire time…has been…" Yami paused; it was almost too impossible to say.

"Yes?"

Yami looked at the pharaoh, hands folded in his composed lap. He knew what Yami was thinking; he knew what he was about to say—but the expectancy in his eyes was urging Yami to finish his sentence—_he_ needed to finish it…

"Seto's been…killing the demon this entire time…"

* * *

Carefully Yugi reached out to Set, and put his hand on the ghost's shoulder. He was surprised his hand actually stayed there, instead of just falling through…

"Hey," he whispered.

The ghost leaned more towards Kaiba—except now his head was tilting downwards, inching towards something lower than Kaiba's shoulder. Yugi looked down.

Kaiba had laid the staff in his lap, and had leaned over to put his elbows on his knees. He was clutching his hands tightly, still staring ahead. He seemed frozen there.

"Hey," Yugi whispered again; he really wanted to get his over with.

The ghost still didn't respond; instead, he proceeded to lift his good arm, and slowly reached out to the staff. Yugi watched; he didn't think he'd be able to take it, but maybe he just needed to touch it, or something…he seemed focused on it, anyway…

The ghost's finger barely grazed the end of the staff—and to Yugi's surprise, it actually moved.

Immediately his eyes flicked to Kaiba's expression. It remained unchanged; he hadn't noticed.

Yugi shook the ghost's shoulder more vigorously.

"Hey!" he said, in his normal speaking voice, "Set—!"

Kaiba blinked. His eyes focused in Yugi's direction.

Crap.

Had he heard that?

For a moment, Yugi remained frozen where he was, watching Kaiba. He seemed to be thinking something over, and Yugi was pretty sure it had to do with him.

Finally, Kaiba moved again; keeping his eyes on the same spot, he leaned back in his seat. The ghost moved under Yugi's hand; it seemed to be excited about this.

It was even more excited when Kaiba, still staring at Yugi, took the staff out of his lap, and set it on the arm of the chair he was in.

Yugi looked over to see that the ghost had its hand wrapped around the staff now, and was actually trying to lift it—

Kaiba snatched the staff back and calmly stood up, putting it in his belt as he did so.

"I'll be right back," he said to no one in particular. No one responded. Anzu and Bakura (the name suddenly fell into Yugi's head again) looked up, but they didn't seem too affected by the statement.

Kaiba then walked out of the automatic doors, Set's ghost trailing behind him, confused.

"_Crap…_" Yugi said under his breath. And so he reluctantly followed, thankful he couldn't feel the cold night…

He managed to jump through the automatic doors at the last minute before they closed behind Seto—

His feet would have landed in snow, if he was in his body. Large, fluffy flakes had already covered everything in a good couple of inches. Yugi heard a lighter clicking on his right; Seto was lighting a cigarette. The ghost stood next to him, still leaning towards Seto's side, eye sockets pointed right at the staff.

Seto exhaled fresh smoke into the air, staring out at the scene before them from under the building's overhang.

"Who are you?" he asked.

Yugi froze; was he supposed to reveal his identity? Was that a bad thing…?

"It's Yugi," he finally said, loud enough for Kaiba to hear.

He didn't respond. Yugi frowned; but back there…

Had he sensed the movement, instead?

If that was the case…

Yugi looked at the newly fallen snow. No one had even stepped in it yet…he picked up a twig from one of the bushes on either side of the automatic doors, and walked out into the snow. Flakes fell through him, and his feed didn't make an imprint on the ground. He was completely invisible; he almost wasn't even there…

Almost.

Now he was starting to see how Atemu felt…

He walked over to stand in front of Seto. He put the stick up to Seto's eye level, just to make sure he could see it. Seto focused on it, looking slightly alarmed at the sudden appearance of a floating bush branch right in front of him.

Yugi wrote his name on the snow, upside-down so Seto could read it from where he was standing.

Seto stared at Yugi's name, expression blank. He looked like he was thinking again, but he didn't want anyone to know that he was.

Yugi decided that he w as a very strange person; not as antagonistic as Yami made him out to be …but more proud than anything. And stubborn. That's probably what kept him and Yami at such odds with each other; they were very similar, in those aspects.

Seto had finished his cigarette by the time he spoke again; this time, his tone wasn't as indifferent as it was before.

"Is—Yami with you?" he said hesitantly. He sounded like he was fighting concern, to Yugi. It was very, very subtle, but Yugi had been doing this kind of thing so long that it was almost easy to hear, now.

"Yes," he wrote with the stick.

Kaiba read the word as Yugi was writing it, putting his hand around the staff in the meantime.

"I'm guessing you need the staff for something?" He asked the words in the snow.

Yugi drew an arrow pointing to his 'yes'.

Slowly, Kaiba pulled the staff out from his belt, and, after looking around to make sure no one was around, he held it out at arm's length. Before Yugi could touch it, though, another ghostly hand had lifted it from Kaiba's hands, his mutilated face twisted into an elated expression.

Immediately, the staff started to glow a soft, golden color, lighting up the snow around them. Set gave out a feeble, crackled laugh, and brought the staff closer to him; if his other arm hadn't been broken, he would have been hugging it close.

For a moment nothing else happened; the staff just got brighter, illuminating the dark corners of the lawn that the emergency room's lights didn't reach to. Set's expression was full of relief. It made him look a little less creepy.

Suddenly, the staff stopped glowing. The absence of light made everything else seem darker than before. Still, somehow, he managed to locate where the staff had gone; it had fallen with a soft _thunk_ onto the lawn.

But Set still had a shadow of the staff in his hand—if objects could have souls, it looked like the staff's soul had just been taken from its physical being.

Yugi thought back to the story Atemu had told about how the curse had formed, and how Set had put so much of himself into making the demon that he lost himself to it…maybe the staff had become a part of him too.

Whatever the case, he seemed ready to go now.

Yugi picked up the stick again.

"Thank you," he wrote. Then, he laid the stick on the ground and put his hand on Set's shoulder again.

"Set," he said.

The ghost tilted his ear in Yugi's direction.

"Oh, _now_ you hear me…"

Nonetheless, Yugi closed his eyes, and thought of the room he'd left.

A white door appeared before him.

Making sure to keep his hand on Set's shoulder, he opened the door in front of him, and gently pulled Set ahead of him, ushering him through before closing the door behind both of them…

* * *

Kaiba picked up the staff.

It didn't feel as heavy anymore.

And despite himself, Kaiba felt the corner of his mouth twitch; maybe this curse would be broken, after all…

He covered up the words in the snow, and went back inside

* * *

A/N: yay! Another chapter finished!

So that explains Seto. Now I can continue on with breaking the curse, and all.

Until next time!

--Trem.


	39. The Final Step

A/N: Almost there, guys! Yaaay!

Chapter Thirty-Nine: The Final Step

* * *

"He'll miss you."

Bakura clenched his fists; he didn't think he'd actually say it, but in the end he'd managed to spit it out…not that it'd matter; Kaiba probably wouldn't listen to him anyway—

He was suddenly standing, and turned in Bakura's direction.

It was impossible to think so, but he seemed…pained.

It was probably because he was just trying to hold back and not say something nasty. He usually tried, but he just couldn't help himself. Which what was infuriating about him.

Still, he and Yami had somehow ended up friends. So here he was, trying to make things better so that Yami wouldn't seem so sullen, thinking about it like it was somehow his fault.

Bakura would never understand Yami, at times—

"Let him."

Bakura blinked.

"…What?" he asked quietly.

Kaiba glanced at him again.

"Let him," he said, enunciating the words.

Bakura frowned.

"What's that supposed to mean—"

But Kaiba was already halfway across the room, headed for the door.

"Wait!" Bakura yelled. He stumbled through the rows of seats after him, ignoring the surprised faces of Kaiba's homeroom class as he passed by. Normally they would make him freeze up in shy fear, but in the moment, it just didn't matter.

By the time he made it to the hallway, Kaiba was already walking through the front doors of the school.

Bakura wobbled to a stop, regaining his balance, listening as everyone around him started whispering and muttering, trying to figure it all out…

* * *

Bakura realized he was staring at the double doors Kaiba had walked out of a few minutes ago. He shook his head, and wrapped his arms around his middle again.

He didn't realize Kaiba was that dangerous before…and now here he was, trying to act like he was concerned. Something told Bakura it _was_ concern, but…he couldn't see how it really could be…not after what Yami told him…

He looked at the hallway to the emergency room; a large, ominous hole in the wall leading to a bad place. He had an urge to just bolt back there and see Yami. But on the other hand…if he didn't make it out…

He didn't want his last memory of Yami as seeing him dead.

It was strange, how calm he was when he thought that.

Bakura chalked it up to shock, and tried to think about something else before he lost his dinner…his stomach was already inside out right now, so full of knots and nerves that it felt as though it were about to collapse on itself…

So why did he feel so calm?

* * *

A door appeared before Yami and Atemu.

"Ah," Atemu said, "it is them."

Yami turned his eyes towards the opening door before them, but his mind was still on Kaiba…of all the ways for things to turn out…he _really_ hadn't expected that…

What did pull his attention to the present was what came through the door first.

A mutilated, decaying corpse of an old man, so thin he seemed starved. Yami started, staring as he shuffled through the door, looking around the room with gouged out eye sockets. One of his arms was broken and bleeding, as though the wound were new. The other was carrying a staff of some kind…it was gold…

He stopped when he'd come through the doorway. Soon Yugi came into view, taking his hand down from the man's back, where he'd obviously been pushing him in the right direction. He glanced over the figure as he came through. He shivered.

"You look even more creepy in color…"

"Yes," Atemu said, looking the man over, "He is looking worse since you fight him last."

The man gasped, and his head snapped in the direction of Atemu's voice. Atemu let out a small laugh, and smiled warmly.

"_Iene sa_," he said, "_Set_."

The man's eyebrows shot up, and his expression turned hopeful—Yami was surprised he could tell his expressions through the wounds.

"_Sal na_!" he exclaimed, in a hoarse voice that leapt from his throat in barely a whisper, "_Atem_!"

"_Ha_," Atem said

The man let out a cry that sounded like something between agony and joy, and he stumbled in Atemu's direction, reaching out with his arm that had the staff. It looked like he was trying to move his broken arm, too, as though he hadn't noticed he'd lost control of it.

They embraced, the man blithering in what Yami assumed was ancient Egyptian—for one, it sounded an awful lot like what Yami had heard when he was drowning in Atemu's memories…

Yugi sat down next to Yami on the edge of the pool of memories. It was a lot more calm since Yami had thrown Kaiba's memories back in; now, it looked like mercury, faintly rippling with the vibrations of people's movements around the room.

"Tell me when it's time to get out of here," Yugi said. His face was blank. He might have been tired, or annoyed…Yami couldn't tell.

"How am I supposed to know?" Yami asked.

"You're going to break the curse," Yugi reminded him, "remember? Atemu told me to get Set and bring him back so that the curse could be finished?"

Yami blinked.

"Oh, yeah…"

"It's not like it's been that long," Yugi said.

Yami would have responded, but something very obvious had just clicked in his mind.

"So that means…that's Set?"

Yugi turned his blank stare on Yami.

"I'm not answering that."

Yami shot him a glare.

"Okay, if that's Set, then explain to me why he and Atemu are acting like they're glad to see each other?"

"I don't know. You were in the memory pool, not me."

Yami looked to Set and Atem. Atem seemed…happier than Yami had ever seen him. He was talking animatedly, and there was a spark of life in his crimson eyes that hadn't been there before…

Even though Set had cursed him with the demon in the first place…here they were, reminding Yami of those movies where two close friends find each other again after searching for years on end. The orchestra music would be playing right now. Someone should be crying, or saying something sentimental.

Maybe they were, actually, and Yami just couldn't understand them. They seemed like they had a lot to say, anyway…

"I think it'll be a while," Yugi said. He was watching them, too.

Slowly, Yami nodded.

"Yeah…"

"Oh, by the way," Yugi said, "Set was in the emergency room at Domino Hospital."

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"Apparently they took our bodies there. Everyone's in the waiting room."

"…what do you mean by 'everyone'?" Yami asked warily. If there was an ambulance involved…

Yugi tilted his head to the ceiling, rattling off the names.

"Your parents, your grandparents I think, Anzu, Bakura…Kaiba…"

"Kaiba came to the emergency room?" Yami asked blankly.

"Yup," Yugi said, "Seemed pretty worried, too. He didn't want anyone to know about it, though."

Yami looked away. He knew that if Yugi could read an emotion in someone's expression, it was probably there. His immediate thought was that Kaiba didn't want to get blamed for the demon coming out and he was worrying about what he was going to say to Yami's parents. But the reasoning was hollow. Empty.

Illogical.

Yami wrapped his arms around his middle again.

"How do you know that?" he asked.

"I had to get the staff from him; Set wouldn't leave without it."

"You talked to him?"

"Yeah. He asked if you were with me."

"…oh," Yami said.

He felt very, very awkward, all of the sudden…

* * *

Yugi didn't know why he was telling Yami all of this. It just seemed like something interesting to do …

Maybe he was curious to see what would happen if he meddled, for once.

He looked at Set and Atem again. Set was talking now, pointing to his arm and eyes, making hand motions.

Suddenly, a thought fell into his head, and after thinking it, he didn't know why it hadn't come to mind before…

If Set had put himself into the demon when he was creating it, and he only showed up after they killed the demon…didn't that mean that his spirit was affected by whatever happened to it?

It would explain eyes and the arm; Anzu and Kaiba had gouged out the demon's eyes, and it had broken its own arm after trying to throw Kaiba off. Atemu had even commented on it just now…that was probably why the demon faded away afterwards, too; it was taking on a new form…

"Huh," Yugi said aloud.  
"What?" Yami asked. His voice sounded dead.

Yugi shook his head.

"Nothing…"

Yami nodded, and went back to his glum brooding. Yugi had a thought that he could meddle some more and ask what was wrong, but…he decided against it.

He had said enough for now. Might as well see how it played out first, before he got too involved…

It was an ironic thought, considering where he was, at the moment…

* * *

Everyone looked up when the automatic doors opened again and Kaiba's tall, thin figure walked in, bringing the smell of fresh cigarette smoke on a gust of frozen air.

Anzu didn't look away when he glanced at her. It wasn't for long—but just the fact that there was so much tension in the room already made Anzu feel like she had to help relieve it, somehow. She didn't think badly of Kaiba, really—and she didn't know if she'd conveyed that in that short of a glance, but… it was better than nothing.

She watched, as he made his way past her, and stopped in front of Yami's parents.

"May I speak with you for a moment?"

They all exchanged wary glances with each other. Yami's mother looked extremely pale, and stressed; Anzu felt her heart drop just looking at her.

What a horrible way to find out where your son was after his basketball game…

Slowly, Mr. Atemuryoku motioned to get out of his chair.

"That's not necessary," Kaiba said.

He settled back onto the blue plastic.

"What is it?" he said quietly.

Kaiba sat down in the empty chair next to Yami's father, right in the corner of the waiting room. The receptionist glanced at them, before going back to her chapter book. It must have been a slow night.

Yami's mother shied away from Kaiba, even though she was sitting on the other side of her husband.

"…I know I probably shouldn't say this here," Kaiba said in a hushed voice, "but…I know you would like to know what happened, after the basketball game was over."

"I thought you already told us," Mr. Atemuryoku said frigidly.

"I didn't give you all the details," Kaiba rebutted, his expression completely impermeable.

Nothing was said for a long moment. Anzu felt someone's eyes on her, and turned to see that Yami's grandfather was looking at her. She smiled weakly, and nodded. He nodded and waved, then turned the other way towards Kaiba and Yami's father.

Slowly, Mr. Atemuryoku nodded.

"What is there left to tell?" he asked.

Kaiba kept his gaze locked with Yami's father the entire time he was talking. He didn't even blink.

"The demon came into this world through the necklace. When it did, Yami passed out. This is the state he is in now. The demon made itself vulnerable by giving itself a shape, a body to move around in more easily. It was already dying inside the necklace. Like a wounded animal."

"What happened to it?" Yami's mom asked in a whisper.

Kaiba turned his gaze towards Anzu. Anzu straightened in her seat, giving everyone an awkward smile.

"Anzu, Yugi, and I were enough to put it out of its misery," Kaiba said, "It wasn't in its right mind, and so it acted on impulse rather than on strategy. After we blinded it, it tried to get rid of us by flying above the football field and diving into it. The impact was fatal."

After a long silence, Kaiba stood again.

"I know it's not comforting to you," he said, staring at a spot above everyone's heads, "but the curse is broken, whether or not Yami is alive."

Every creak of the plastic chair could be heard in the ringing silence that followed, as Kaiba got out of the chair and walked back to where he'd been sitting before. He picked up the staff, then headed towards the exit.

"Kaiba."

Kaiba's feet shuffled to a stop at threshold of the automatic doors. Frigid air blasted into the waiting room, along with some snowflakes.

Mr. Atemuryoku stood. His fists were clenched.

"Where are you going?"

Kaiba put the staff under his belt, and put his hands in his pockets.

"Home," he replied, glancing at everyone again. Snowflakes were falling into his hair now.

"Isn't it a little cold out there to be walking right now?" Anzu asked.

As if on cue, Bakura shivered next to her, and put his arms around his knees.

Kaiba shook his head.

"I've walked through worse."

And with that, he stepped out into the night, pulling his trenchcoat around him as he went.

* * *

"Yami?"

Yami looked up to see that Atemu was standing in front of him, looking concerned. Set was sitting next to Yugi, a smile on his face.

"You are not feeling well?"

Yami tightened his arms around his waist. They seemed to be glued to his sides permanently…

"No…I feel sick…"

He felt a warm hand on his forehead.

"Ah," Atemu said knowingly, taking his hand away, "your heart is not right."

Despite himself, Yami gave the pharaoh a strange look.

"what does my heart have to do with my stomach?"

"Your stomach is not here to be hurt," the pharaoh reminded him, "only soul. Mind and heart."

"…oh."

"I think…you are feeling guilt," the pharaoh said thoughtfully, "you should not feel guilt. But you are. Embarrass, too."

"…what?" Yami asked flatly; that wasn't what he was expecting…

"Well, you and Seto are friend. Then, he threaten you with unleashing demon. You become enemy for very long time. You are afraid of him and his threat, even after he say it is not true. You are not trusting him. Now, in memory, you see he is being control by demon. You go back in memory, look at all the times you are fighting with him—"

"How do you know all this?" Yami demanded, cutting him off. Atemu did not seem perturbed by the fact that he was rudely interrupted. He just smiled that small smile Yami had seen so much of since coming in here in the first place.

"I am living in glass box, Yami," he said, holding his hands out in front of him, as though he were placing them on an imaginary wall, "I see everything relating to necklace, and I can go and watch people who are connect to it. But they cannot see me, or hear. For hundred of year, I try to figure out why."

Yami looked away. What did this have to do with anything?

"Then I realize," the pharaoh went on, "I must make them see me. I am having to ask someone to see me, to ask for help to get out of curse. I must reach out to other. I never do this in life. This is how I meet Yugi. Remember library?"

Yami froze, at the sudden question.

"Um…"

"When feel demon, and see me?"

"Oh," Yami said dully, "I guess that _was_ you…"

"Yes, that is first time you see me," Atemu said, "I work very hard for that to happen. But demon see me, and break my spell before I talk to you. But this is not what I am meaning to say," he said, waving his hand.

"What I am meaning to say is that this is first time I understand curse completely, even more than Set, who is making it in first place. Every time before, I try to talk to people holding necklace. But they do not see. Only hear, if that. I realize why, now."

He put his hand on Yami's shoulder, and kneeled so that he was eye level with Yami. His expression was kind, and warm.

"It is because I am changing mind, Yami. I see that only way for people to see me is I reach out for _them_—not for way out of curse in them. I have to trust other to help me, to free me. I am helpless now. The only useful power I have now is power of word. I always rely on strength, in life. I never rely on mind, even three thousand year later, when I try to force myself through demon to see you with magic. But word is all I have now, I see after this.

"I see Yugi is changing mind, and trusting what he is not before. He is tired of being alone, and is trusting stranger with things he never tell anyone before. I see how clearly I see him—I see him, and nothing else. I give him power, make connection with him, make sure he is not fade again. This is how he is key. I can talk to him, because I allow myself to see him for sake of seeing him—not for sake of curse, even though I tell him about curse—"

"Not very much about it," Yugi said, "you scared the crap out of me more than anything."

Atemu laughed.

"I am sorry I scare you," he said, "It is not my purpose."

He turned back to Yami.

"You see how I am thinking now," he said, "and I think if you do the same, you will not feel guilt. You should not feel guilt. It is not your fault. Change how you think. If you talk to Kaiba for sake of talking, and not for curse…you will find your friend again."

Yami looked at his feet.

"Think about it," Atemu said, giving Yami a sharp tap on the chest with the back of his hand.

"It will be good for you."

Yami was suddenly reminded of his grandfather, when he was younger. He shrugged.

"I guess…"

There was a silence. Atemu proceeded to sit down on the floor in front of Yami, situating himself so that he was cross-legged, talking as he did so in a much brighter voice than before.

"You and I are looking very same, yes?"

Yami looked the pharaoh up and down.

"Yeah," he said. Then he looked to the pharaoh's hair.

"Mine's dyed," he said, pointing to his own.

"Mine is same," Atemu said. Then, his eyes widened, "Oh, I am scared, if hair is like this coming out of head."

Yami felt a laugh come up. He was suddenly reminded of Bakura when he was imitating Yami's clueless expression.

"What is it?" Atemu asked, catching the action, "It is crazy, yes?" he asked, waving his hand around his hair, indicating it, "This hair is too crazy. What are people thinking, making hair like this?"

Yami started laughing outright. And suddenly, he didn't feel bad anymore. He didn't know how, but…he suddenly got the feeling that things were finally, inevitably going to work out. It didn't matter if he understood it or not. It was just going to happen the right way.

Maybe Atemu had put some kind of magic on him; he didn't think his mood would swing that quickly…

"I am right, Yes? Hair is crazy!"

"It's pretty wild," Yami agreed, controlling himself again.

"So why you make hair like this?"

Yami shrugged.

"I think it's pretty cool. I might change it, though."

"Aha," Atemu said, "You get too old for it, and then you see. You look back on ah, what is it, ehm—picture, you look back on picture and go, 'I am ruin picture by looking so crazy!'"

Yami laughed again. He definitely was reminded now of family members that came over every so often.

"Oh, oh, I know! You dye it red only! Make it darker, match eyes! This is what I want to do, but I get curse, and I stay like this."

Yami controlled himself again.

"How old were you when you died?" Yugi asked.

Atemu shrugged.

"I do not know what it is in your time," he said, "my calendar is very different. I am old in my year, but I know here life is longer. I do not know what is old and young in your time."

"You didn't look that old in your memories," Yami said, "Probably in your early 20's, or so."

Atemu was waving his hand.

"It does not matter," he said, "not now. You are better now, so we need to be serious..."

Definitely magic, Yami decided. Through the warm glow the laughter left behind, Yami wondered why Atemu felt like he needed to do that.

Something bad must have been about to happen.

A silence fell over all of them. Atemu stood up again.

"Now is time for curse breaking to finish. It start when Kaiba kill demon itself—now you must finish breaking curse."

"So how do I do that—"

Atemu held up his hand.

"There are still thing I want to say," he said, looking at Yami, "before this happen. I make joke so that you are listen to this now, instead of stuck in guilt. I do not know how I will die, so I am wanting to say this now."

That explained it. So it wasn't magic; just Yami having mood swings. Nothing new.

Inwardly, Yami tried to swallow the feeling of foreboding, for now…

No one spoke. Atemu put his hand down again. Yami could see the leader in him now, that he saw in the memories. Except now he seemed much wiser.

"Yugi."

Yugi looked over from staring at Set, who hadn't seemed to notice.

"Yes?"

"Use what I give you well. You can open door anywhere you go. Mind, physical place, anywhere. You can always find way through barrier, now. Even to other world."

Yugi nodded.

"I'll practice," he said.

"Make more friend, too," Atemu said, smiling again, "it is not bad to make friend."

Yugi looked away. He didn't say anything to that.

Atemu turned to Yami. He was still smiling.

"You are going to break curse," he said, "You give yourself gift of freedom—it is what you give others around you by standing up for them. Now it is come back to you. Use freedom well. Do good things that you want to do because of you. Not because of necklace."

Yami clenched his fists; they were clammy, all the sudden.

"So…this is it? It's finally going to end?"

Atemu nodded slowly.

"And…it'll be gone, just like that? What'll happen to Kaiba? Will he just…not feel that pull to hate anymore?"

But the Pharaoh just shook his head.

"It is not as easy to get rid of feeling of hate. Even for Kaiba, with strong will, the feelings of heart he cannot control. They will not be hate itself—he turn this around already. This is how he battle curse. But what those feelings turn into now…no one know."

Yugi was frowning, as he listened to the Pharaoh's explanation.

"So…he still hates Yami, but he doesn't know it?"

"No," the pharaoh said, "That strength of feeling for Yami that is fill with hate for so long is still there. This is what I am saying. When he try to feel apathy, he broke connection between Yami and hate. But he do not feel apathy. The energy behind that hate is still there."

"So whatever he starts to feel for Yami, it's going to be strong?"

"Yes," the Pharaoh said, nodding. "That is what will happen."

"…Oh," Yami said. "So…he'll still be in the habit of hating me, curse or no?"

"Talk to him for talking to him," Atemu said, "You will see what will happen for yourself. Now, we are having to do this soon—your body is not lasting much longer without soul. I can feel it…"

Yami frowned.

"Wait—what do you mean?"

"You are in hospital right now, Yami. You are unconscious, but you still have heartbeat. You are still breathing. But if you are staying much longer, you will not be able to go back."

"What?!" Yami shouted. It echoed off the walls of the small space they were in, ringing in Yami's ears.

"Your body right now is like open wound that has not been treated; things you don't want to get in it might get in, and they will hurt."

"Like what?!" Yami asked, still panicked.

Atemu shrugged.

"I do not know," he said, "but it is not good to find out."

Atemu turned around. Everyone watched him, as he held out his hands. They glowed white for a moment, before shooting out at the wall in front of him. The light morphed into the shape of a rectangle, and faded away, leaving behind a doorway with a purple curtain over it, blocking the view beyond.

"This is your way out," Atemu said, turning back to them, "I am making doorway to outside world. I am never doing before, so if it is not working…" he nodded to Yugi, "You will have to find way."

"Right."

Atemu turned to Yami again. Yami realized his arm muscles were locked up and aching. Why did he feel so _scared_…?

"What you are about to do, Yami, is what many ancestor before you are not able to do. They see wall, and cannot get through. You have friend around you that help you see. Now, you know everything you need to break curse."

Yami frowned.

"I…do…?"

Atemu was walking over to Set.

"_Set_," he said, "_thene_."

"_Ha_," Set croaked. He held out the staff to Atemu, who took it with both hands. After examining it for a few seconds, he wrapped his hand around the spherical top, and pulled. It came off, revealing a long, pointed dagger underneath.

Atem frowned at the large, black stains on it.

"Yugi," he asked, "do you use _this_…to kill demon?"

"Kaiba had it," Yugi said, "I think he ended up stabbing it in the back of the head."

Atemu walked around to Set's side, and looked at the back of his head.

"Ah," he said, "I see now. That is smart…"

"Um…" Yugi said, watching the pharaoh, "if Kaiba stabbed Set in the brain, how is he still alive?"

Yami felt a wave of sickness wash over him. He moved a stiff arm around to clench his stomach. Again.

"He is damaging demon's body. Set is not body. Set is soul of demon."

"Oh," Yugi said, shrugging. "Makes sense, I guess."

Atemu set the handle of the staff on the ledge of the pool next to Set.

"It is not need to be explain," he said, walking back over to Yami. He held out the dagger.

A cold lump of dread fell into Yami's gut as he stared at the dagger. It looked disgusting, covered in black, flaky blood….

"Um…" he asked tentatively, "W-what…do I do with…this…?"

"It is easy," Atemu said, "You must set Set free. With demon and his spirit gone, curse will finish. You bear necklace now. It is your job. Are you understanding?"

For a long, agonizing moment, nothing moved. Nothing was said. Cotton seemed to be shoved in Yami's ears, and he couldn't hear anything other than the ringing of his own head.

The dagger seemed to get closer as he focused on it, taking in the sharp edges, the long, pointed tip that looked like it could serve as a needle…

Needle.

Set free.

That meant kill.

Yami had to kill what was left of Set.

"…_WHAT!??_"

* * *

A/N: Curse will be broken next chapter, I promise. Only a couple chapters left, and we're done!

Until next time! Which will be soon!

--Trem.


	40. The End

A/N: The chapter title's kind of a misnomer; it's not the actual end of the story yet. I'm going to take these author's notes out of here, once I'm done with this thing…

Chapter Forty: The End.

* * *

"Yami, you must calm down—"

"He's _solid_—!"

"Yami—"

"There's no way—"

"You are having to now, Yami—"

"Oh, god—"

"Yami—"

"How am I supposed to _do_ this—!"

"YAMI!"

Silence. Yugi hadn't heard that loud or stern of a voice come out of Atemu…ever. Yami looked deathly pale. The hand that was holding the dagger was trembling. He was going to drop it any minute, Yugi was sure. Set was standing on Atemu's other side, back straight, arms at his sides, unresponsive.

"How else is curse being broken?!" Atemu snapped. He looked nervous to Yugi, despite his efforts to hide it…

"How else is curse stop?!" he said, "We are keeping alive for three thousand year, thinking of mistake we make in life, making whole family suffer! Set is in demon! He is watching as demon _he make_ kill family for thousand of year! He will not fight you! We are waiting for this for long time—!"

The dagger clattered to the floor; Yami had fallen to his knees, head in his hands.

"Yami!"

"Why can't Yugi do it?" Yami moaned, "I'm not good with this…"

"Yami, what happen?" Atemu said, coming over and kneeling at Yami's side. Yami had put his face in his hands, curling over so that his head was almost touching the floor.

"I can't do this…"

….was Yami about to cry?

Atemu put his hand on Yami's back.

"oh," he said, after a moment, "…I see."

"What is it?" Yugi asked.

"He is having fear of blood," Atemu said.

"Can you _please_ just get Yugi to do it?!" Yami asked, pushing himself back to a sitting position. He really _was_ crying; Yugi was startled to see that there were tears running down Yami's face. Yami realized it too.

"Shit…"

He wiped his face off.

"I was fine when Set just had some on his arm," he choked out, "but I'm _not_ about to make any more start coming out!"

…Something wasn't adding up. Not that this was the time to be thinking of it, but the question fell out of Yugi's mouth anyway.

"Yami…"

Yami looked up.

"You're strong. And you fight well, so obviously you've had practice…how can you be afraid of blood?"

"Eh, Yugi," Atemu said, dismissing the question with a wave of his hand, "do not ask this now. You are outside body too long already, now is not time to ask question, you need to go back—"

"That's another thing."

They both were looking at him now. Vaguely, Yugi realized this was the first time he could remember just spitting out a question and not analyzing the responses he would probably get.

"Atemu…You said our bodies were like an open wound. Does that mean…that something else could get in there? And how do you know that we'll actually make it back to our bodies after this? Do you know what's going to happen after the curse ends? "

"In a sense…we're already dead..."

Yami. His eyes were wide; frightened.

Atemu had that saddened look again.

So there _was_ something more to all of this.

"It is true I do not know what is happen after curse end," Atemu said. He forced the words out, as if he knew they wouldn't be well received.

"But I see soul being ripped from body by demon before, in life. The body try to live afterward, in coma. But…it does not wake up. Eventually, it die."

Yami closed his eyes again.

"So there's no guarantee that we're going to live through this?" he asked, his voice becoming more panicked the more the spoke, "after all this, and we might be stranded outside our bodies forever?!"

His eyes shot open. The only other time Yugi had ever seen such desperate, blind fear behind someone's eyes was the one time he had watched his mom go into one of her episodes, before she left.

"Do not think about it like this, Yami—!"

"We're dead, Atemu!" Yami yelled, "What other way is there—?!"  
"YOU STILL HAVE CHANCE!"

The silence rang in Yugi's ears. Atemu's eyes were redder than ever before, burning as he stared Yami down, like a dog that had gotten out of line.

Yami shied away. He wasn't expecting that. Yugi wasn't phased; he knew Atemu had been holding back ever since he came back with Set from the outside world. He'd snapped.

"You have chance, Yami!" he said again, his voice cracking, "You have chance to live after! You are not trap in here! You have way out other than death! You have body to come to! Mine is gone, I watch it go! Bones not even left now! And now you are scared that it is not guarantee! You are only one that can do this!" Atemu grabbed the dagger off the ground by its blade and shoved the handle in front of Yami's face.

"_This _is way out! _This_ is how you have chance to live! Not sit here afraid, that is not way!" he threw the dagger down in front of Yami," Only you! Curse is given to you, _you_ are cursed one! I am not cursed one, I am bound by curse! I am _part_ of curse! Only one who _is_ curse can _break_ it! That is why Set is still here, even after Kaiba kill demon Set make. If he is cursed, this would be end. But _you_ are curse."

Yami hadn't moved. He stared at the dagger in front of him with empty eyes.

Atemu stood.

"It is only way to end three thousand year of suffering," he said. He sounded defeated.

"If you are wanting to stay here and let body go because of fear, then curse is not ready to break. I cannot do more than what I have done. I am sorry."

He then walked to the far end of the room and sat down on the edge of the memory pool, on the side opposite to Yugi. He sighed.

"Tell me when you have decide," he said.

He was holding back again. Yugi could hear it in the guarded tension in his tone.

And still Set stood there, unmoving. Yugi wondered if he really did understand what they were saying, and just chose to pretend not to.

Or maybe he was preparing himself for his final moments of life.

Either way…Yugi had the feeling he'd be waiting a while…

So would grandpa, if things turned out badly.

Yugi tried not to think about that too much…

* * *

"I'm sorry…"

Dad looked at the small bead lodged firmly in the necklace's eye.

"Well," he said, "Nothing else to do besides try to pry it out…"

A few minutes later, Yami was lying on the living room floor while Dad was using pliers to try and dislodge the bead. Yami was about eleven, twelve. He couldn't remember now.

Mom walked in and out, sometimes cautioning Dad to be careful of the necklace, and the rest of the time scolding Yami for getting into her Christmas bracelet project; she had decided that year that she'd make jewelry for everyone, and had left boxes of tiny beads all over the living room.

For the first half hour, it was mildly interesting. But after that, Yami got extremely bored. So he started asking questions.

"Where did it come from?"

"Egypt. You know that," Dad had replied.

"Why do we have it?"

"Because it's been in the family for a very long time."

"Why can't I take it off?"

"Look at your hand. You tell me."

Yami looked down at his right hand. His index finger and thumb were heavily bandaged.

"But why does it burn me?"

"Because it doesn't want to be taken off."

"…Why?"

Dad was silent for a moment. A tiny bit the bead went flying off into the carpet.

"Careful," Mom said, as she walked through to the front hall.

"Because then, it would get lost," Dad said, "And the last thing the necklace wants to do is to get lost."

"Dad," Yami had said, exasperatedly, "I _know_ jewelry doesn't think."

"Oh, really? And how do you _know_?" Dad had asked, imitating Yami's tone.

"Because Mrs. Miller told me." Yami had replied. "She said that in order for something to think, it needs to be alive. Gold isn't alive."

Dad paused.

"I didn't say anything to her about the necklace!" Yami said, before Dad could start lecturing him.

"Good," he said, prying at the bead again. He'd chipped off a good eighth of it by this point.

After a pause, Yami asked,

"Dad…is this magic?"

Dad paused again. Yami remembered registering how depressed his dad looked, when he said,

"Yes. That's why it doesn't make sense."

He jabbed the pliers in the center of the eye.

"I'm sorry, Yami—"

BOOM.

All Yami remembered was light. Bright, golden light, filling up his senses. Mom screamed. Dad screamed, before it was cut off suddenly.

When the light had gone away, Dad was covered in blood on his right side. Completely. Yami was sure he'd die that night, the entire ambulance ride to the hospital.

He almost did, actually. They were told later that Dad was extremely lucky; so lucky the doctors were confused.

It had been the first time Yami had seen that much blood in one place. And afterwards, he wanted it to be the last.

Ever since then, he'd been careful not to let anyone know that the most frightening thing about the entire experience to him was the blood. Not even his parents. He didn't talk about it much afterwards at all. For years. Even now, it only came up when Yami and Dad were fighting…

* * *

Yami's surroundings came back to him. The dagger was the first thing he saw. A new wave of nausea washed over him. He clutched his stomach.

"I figured this was going to happen."

Yugi.

After a pause, Atemu responded.

"What is making you think like this?" he asked in a subdued tone.

"Well," Yugi said, "since you told me what this place was made out of…I thought of how people say that the mind has no limits. So if you put that and the heart together, and then make a place out of it…I figure it'd be easy to get trapped in."

Atemu let out a weak laugh.

"Not without knowing heart," he said, "heart control this place. Mind make it real. I think this is way….maybe it is other way around…ah, I cannot remember, now."

"…Did someone figure it out while you were watching them?" Yugi asked.

"No," Atemu said, "I remember Set telling me in life. He is very excited, when he find out how to get mind to live outside body with magic. It is what he is trying to figure out for so long…he was very happy. More happy than I see him since he is child. I do not understand then—I think it is scary. That magic finally make him crazy. I tell him all through life, that magic will make him crazy, he study so much. He does not believe me.

"So when I come here, and cannot get out… I know what it is. When I remember him talking about this, I see. And then I despair. I know I cannot get out. I know he is smarter than me. I was so, so angry, when I see."

He sighed.

"Heart is strange place," he mused. "It is always so deep inside that we do not think of it. We hide from it when it hurt. But when we are inside…it is making everything we are hiding from bigger."

"…Is this place…_your_ heart?"

"Ah, I do not know," Atemu said, "I am so confuse about it, I stop thinking long ago."

He let out another laugh.

"But maybe this is the problem."

Yugi laughed too—a shadow of the true laughter Yami had only heard out of him once.

"Probably."

"Oh, I am stuck then," Atemu said. He sounded amused. "I never get out."

"Well, if you haven't figured it out in three thousand years..."

"You are mean, Yugi!"

Yugi laughed again. It died down quickly, though.

Slowly, Yami shifted. He was getting sore, in the hunched position he was in. He didn't feel like moving, though. He didn't feel like doing anything, really…

"Eh, Yugi?"

"Huh?"

"What is going to happen to your grandfather, if you do not go back?"  
Yugi didn't respond right away. Yami could feel the awkwardness hanging in the air. It didn't mix well with what was already churning inside him, just below the surface.

"You wanted the curse broken, right?" he said, "you needed my help. Why are you asking about it now?"

A pang of something shot through Yami's body. It was so strong that it rose to the top, making him feel like he was going to explode.

"…that is not answer to what I ask, Yugi," Atemu's voice said gently.

_No it wasn't_, Yami thought, _that wasn't the right answer_.

This whole situation wasn't right. He'd already dragged Yugi so far into this…and then to ask him to risk his _life_? He didn't sign up for this…

Yami watched his own hand reach out, quivering, towards the dagger's handle. This wasn't even Yugi's curse…if anyone had to make a sacrifice…

His grip tightened. The last thing he wanted to do was cause another death, out of the hundreds of innocent people that had suffered already…there _had_ to be some solid way out of this that didn't rely on hoping things worked out—

Wait.

The doorway Atemu made. It was still there.

"You don't have to stay here," Yami croaked out. Blinking, he tilted his sore neck so that he was looking at Yugi. Wide, purple eyes stared back at him.

"If you go though the door back to the outside now, you can go back to your body."

There was shifting of clothing; Atemu stood, and was now walking around the memory pool towards Yami again.

"Yami, you do not know what you are saying—"

"If staying means dying, then yes, I know what I'm saying!" Yami interrupted, looking Atemu in the eye. Atemu didn't look convinced.

Yami shoved himself off the ground, forcing himself to stand on his weak, watery legs.

"Yugi is only one that can force way out!" Atemu snapped back, his expression full of the kind of worry Yami had seen on Dad's face during one of their really bad yelling matches.

"If door is gone after curse break, you are left here! If Yugi go now, you are dying—!"

"I KNOW!" Yami yelled. Atemu frowned, but didn't try to finish his sentence. Yami turned to Yugi.

"GO!" he said, pointing to the door.

Yugi didn't move.

"Why are you so worried about this _now_?" he asked flatly, "All you have to do is stab Set and we're done. We can figure out what to do later—"  
"What the hell is _wrong_ with you?!" Yami shouted, "This isn't even your curse! Why the hell do you even _care_ what happens to me?! _I'm_ the one who's cursed! Not you!"

Yugi looked away.  
"Yami!" Atemu snapped, "do not talk to your friend this way—"

"I'M NOT TAKING ANYONE ELSE WITH ME!"

Two pairs of wide eyes stared back at him.

"You think I haven't been thinking about this all my life?!" Yami asked.

No one responded.

"This curse is all that I am!" he exclaimed, his voice reverberating on the walls, "And until this thing is gone, there is _nothing_ else that matters more! Not my future, not friends, not anything! Not even my _family_ is worth not breaking this curse!"

Yami's voice wavered when he forced the last sentence out. His declaration came from a thought that had been planted deep within him so long ago that he couldn't remember a time when it wasn't there. Everything he was came down to this one moment. He didn't know when he'd come to that conclusion either—but it was the one thing that filled him up and kept him going right now, and he was going to hold onto it until he didn't know what holding on was anymore.

Inwardly he had hoped, dreamed, wanted this moment to come. Before he even knew there was a possible way out, amidst all the nightmares, that one small hope that he might be able to change the unchangeable had kept him from losing himself completely.

"This curse has already killed hundreds of people—probably more. If anyone's going to die…"

Yami swallowed; he needed to keep himself together…

"If anyone's going to die," he heard himself say, "it's going to be me."

Something dulled behind Atemu's crimson eyes. He looked away.

Yugi was giving Yami an incredulous look—like he couldn't believe what was coming out of Yami's mouth.

Somehow, the sight made Yami smile. He thought of the argument he'd had with his parents, where he'd declared that even he died in the process, breaking the curse would be worth it. At the time, the statement had scared him to the core of his being.

Now he realized that ever since then, there was a part of him deep down that was expecting this to happen all along. After all…these kinds of things always included some kind of sacrifice.

He straightened. The dagger wasn't shaking like it was before. He felt like he was standing on solid ground again. Set was still standing there, looking…peaceful.

Ready.

"Yami?"  
Yugi shifted on the edge of the memory pool.

"You realize that if you break the curse and end up staying here…you're going to be trapped forever."

Without hesitation, Yami nodded.

"Yeah," he said, "I know."

Yugi looked up.

"And that doesn't bother you?"

Another wave of fear welled up inside Yami. He swallowed again.

"It bothers me," he admitted, "but…if it means that no one else will suffer from the curse…then that's the only way there is to me."

Yugi raised an eyebrow.

"It is hard to understand," Atemu said solemnly, "but you do not live with curse. You do not see now, but when you are growing up this way…you do not want anyone else to suffer but you. I am feel this way, too. This is why I want you to stay."

He let out a heavy sigh.

"But I see now, that this is how it should be. It is not fair, to risk your life for something I only ask you to do as favor."  
"Look, I really don't mind—"  
"That is not true. Do not convince your mind that it is."

Yugi was silent.

"Maybe some day you understand," Atemu said, "but for now…You must go back. Just in case curse is break and we all stop exist, or something like that."

Yugi looked at Atemu for a moment, just as Yami had done. Slowly, he nodded.

"All right," he said quietly. He pushed himself off the edge of the memory pool, causing minute ripples to form in the reflective liquid.

Yami felt some of the tension dissipate in his chest as he watched Yugi go to the door and reach for the handle. This was how it should be.

Yugi paused before touching the purple curtains.

"Hey, Yami?"

"What?"

Yugi paused, regarding him with large, purple eyes. Yami still found them eerie, even now.

"Is…there anything you want to tell anyone? Last words, I guess…?"

It took a few moments for Yami to process the question. A part of him was surprised that he was even having this conversation…

Nonetheless, Yami took a deep, calming breath before he spoke. Somehow, just speaking was difficult at the moment…

"Well," he said, "I, um….I want Bakura to know about the curse," he started, "I never told him…because I didn't want him to get involved. I didn't want the demon finding him. But he deserves to know."

"Okay," he heard Yugi say.

Yami closed his eyes. It seemed to help him focus, somewhat…

"And….could you tell my parents…and grandparents, if they're still there…that I'm sorry?"

"Yeah."

"And one more thing," Yami said, opening his eyes again. They immediately focused on the dagger.

"If you see Kaiba…could you apologize to him for me? Tell him…that if I had known what the demon was doing to him…that I wouldn't have acted like that. And thank you. I need to thank him too, for what he did…"

His voice trailed off, as he thought of what Kaiba's reaction might be. He probably wouldn't see it, now…

"Anything else?"

Yami searched a blank mind for anything else that he wanted to say…

Slowly, Yami shook his head.

"No," he said, "that's everything."

"Okay," Yugi said, in that same quiet voice. He still seemed shocked.

To be honest, Yami was shocked, too. At…everything, really.

Yugi put his hand on the curtain. As he did so, the barriers surrounding Yami's outer shell started to shake, and crack. He knew he didn't want to do this—he was too young to die, he couldn't just give up like that—

He felt Atemu's hand on his shoulder.

"One more thing, Yugi," he said, walking past Yami to stand in front of Yugi. For a moment they stood there, Yugi looking confused. Then—

Atemu hugged him.

Yugi's eyes widened, surprised.

"Um—"

"I thank you for everything," Atemu said, letting go and holding Yugi out at arm's length.

"I cannot do it enough."

Again, Yugi nodded.

"Yeah," he said, "you too. For the…the power thing, and all."

Atemu smiled, practically beaming.

"Come," he said, motioning towards the door, "You are having more life to live."

Yugi pulled the curtains open.

"Good luck, Yami." He said.

Then, he stepped through the curtains…

And then he was gone.

…

As soon as Yugi was out of sight, Atemu paused. His warm expression vanished.

"…What's wrong?" Yami found himself asking, even though the question was a bit ironic now.

Atemu shook his head.

"It is not right," he said heavily, "that you are so young. I feel I have fail, now. I want to make this happy for you…"

His eyes flicked over to the dagger in Yami's hands.

"But…this is right way, I think."

Yami looked at his own hand. His knuckles were white.

"….Do you think…"

"What?" Atemu's voice asked, after Yami had trailed off. Yami swallowed, and tried again.

"Do you think…I'll—die…?"

"No, you will not die," Atemu said. His voice sounded pained.

"But I cannot say if you will be able to get out of this place."

"….So I might live forever…in here?"

Atemu nodded solemnly.

"Maybe it will be like this," he said. "That is why I want Yugi to stay, and he will find way out, I know. But if he cannot, he is trap here as well. I know why you tell him to go. As you say, it is not his curse. I do not want to bring him here in first place. But now he is gone, it make this harder for you."

Again, Yami felt the weight of Atemu's hand on Yami's shoulder.

"It is sad," Atemu said, shaking his head again, "Very sad."

Yami looked at Set again. He hadn't moved.

"Does he understand what we're saying?"

"Oh, I do not know," Atemu said, "He may. He always hide secret, even in life. Maybe this is one of them."

"I don't want to catch him off-guard, or anything…"

"Oh, he is waiting," Atemu replied, a shadow of a smile flickering across his face.

"He wait for long time. Do not worry about it; he will not be surprise."

"Oh."

Yami looked at Set's face—it was…serene, almost.

"I guess he's been waiting for this for a long time, too, huh?"

"Yes," Atemu said, "he is."

Somehow…Yami felt much, much calmer. Now it was just him, Atemu, and Set. Even if he died…it would be over.

Completely over.

For everyone.

He tightened his grip on the dagger.

"Well," he said after a pause, "Here goes nothing..."

As he took a deep breath and leaned forward, time seemed to slow down. He thought about how he'd been fighting for this moment his entire life, even when everyone else told him it wasn't worth it. Dad told him he'd practically be committing suicide.

He took a step forward.

He hoped he'd get back to everyone. He wanted to see his parents again.

Another step.

He wanted to take the necklace off.

Step.

He wanted to free Atemu.

Step.

Step.

He wanted freedom…

He didn't hesitate. He leaned forward, that one word filling the forefront of his mind; he saw it everywhere, as he put one foot in front of the other, suspended in the moment. Set wanted freedom from his guilt and regret. Atemu wanted to put the nightmare he'd been living in for three thousand years behind him. Yugi wanted to go back to his normal life, before Yami got involved in it. Mom, Dad, Grandma, Granddad, Bakura, Anzu….they all deserved better than what Yami had been able to give them. Even Kaiba, strangely enough. If nothing else, he deserved to be freed from the grasp of the demon.

Yami broke into a run, holding the dagger out in front of him—he saw an unknown future being made right here as he took in everything that was a part of this instant that was changing his past, present, and future.

He didn't look at where the dagger was going; he positioned his arm so that he was aiming for the chest, the heart—at the very last second he shut his eyes—

Light.

He barely felt the dagger pierce Set before everything was obliterated by bright, golden light—the same kind of light that filled him when the necklace had hurt Dad, all those years ago…

He felt warm…

Was this…?

* * *

Machines.

That was the first thing Yugi remembered hearing. Then footsteps.

He forced his eyes open. Everything was white.

"You're awake," someone said. He didn't recognize the voice.

He tried to talk. Nothing coherent came out. Whoever it was wasn't paying attention anyway. They were standing next to him, doing something next to Yugi's head.

"Well, I think you've pretty much stabilized," he said. Yugi looked up.

A guy in a blue…suit thing was looking down at him.

"We have someone who wants to see you, if you think you're ready."

"…Grandpa?" He managed to croak out.

"Yes, that's who he said he was," the man said. He seemed really…happy.

It was creepy.

Yugi nodded.

"I'll let him in, then," the guy said. He left.

Vaguely, Yugi wondered how grandpa found out he was here…

Large, fluorescent lights hung above him. They looked like the school lights…

Slowly, he lifted one of his hands. A skin-covered, solid hand came into his line of sight.

Looked like he was back in his body again.

Yugi registered the tube coming from the top of his hand. Didn't look like he was going anywhere anytime soon, though…

He hoped Yami was all right…

Grandpa came in a few moments later and sat down next to Yugi, sighing like an old man with bad joints. He regarded Yugi with an unreadable expression. Yugi knew he was hiding whatever was going on in his mind; he knew how Grandpa's eyes glinted when he did it. How he moved about…how he held himself.

"Well," he finally said, "It's good to see you up."

Yugi nodded; it was all he felt like doing at the moment. The silence that passed between them after that didn't help, either.

Grandpa shifted in his chair.

Yugi swallowed.

Grandpa took a breath.

Yugi looked to him.

"I, um…just got finished talking to the nurse," he said, looking Yugi in the eye. Yugi simply stared back.

"You had two fractured ribs, Yugi. The nurse estimated that they got fractured a while ago. They never got treated. They healed on their own. Badly."

There was another silence that drew out between them; a naked one, raw with shock. Yugi's mouth went dry, and he stayed still, staring at Grandpa with that same goddamned expression he'd been using his whole life…

So that's what had hurt so much after Joey had beat him up…it seemed like forever ago, and the pain had gone away after a while..

"I think… you and I need to talk, Yugi," Grandpa said, his voice tentative. Yugi recognized the slight shake as his grandfather spoke, and the way he looked down at the floor.

It was Yugi's voice, aged by time. Right down to the slowly getting quieter, as the sentence went on.

Yet…something was different this time, between Yugi and his grandfather. He said something different.

"Yeah," he croaked.

Grandpa's eyes shot from the ground to Yugi.

"What?" he asked.

"I…" Yugi swallowed another spitless swallow and tried again, fidgeting with his fingers as he spoke, "I've got some….some things that, um…There are some things I should tell you."

"…Really?" Grandpa replied, in a politely conversational tone; as though Yugi had told him a bit of current world news he hadn't heard yet.

Yugi nodded, still feeling awkward as hell. Grandpa nodded—a motion that was a little overdone, but the intention was visible.

"Well, then…" he said, "We'll do that."

"Before that, though," Yugi said, "I need to do something…"

"What's that, Yugi?" Grandpa asked.

Yugi paused; why did he feel so lethargic?

"Did they tell you I came in here with another person?"

"Yes. Why?"

"I need to know if he's…still alive, I guess—I'll explain later, but—"

"Hey, everything all right?"

It was the happy guy again.

"Actually…" Grandpa said, "Do you know where the other person that was brought in with my grandson is? Or if he's all right?"

The guy looked at the ceiling, as though the information was there.

"_Well…_"

* * *

"Yes, I'm his father. How is he?"

"Well," The nurse said, "he looks like he's stabilized—"  
"Oh, thank goodness," Yami's mom breathed. Anzu let out a sigh of relief, too, and next to her, Bakura put his face in his hands.

"—_But_…"

"But what?" Mr. Atemuryoku asked.

"He doesn't show any signs of recovering from his current state."

"…what does that mean?" Mrs. Atemuryoku asked.

The nurse took a deep breath.

"He's comatose. According to the doctor, he doesn't look like he's going to come out of it within the next 24 hours as his body has gone through a lot of physical trauma, and after that, it's very hard to predict what will happen..."

* * *

"Thank you," Grandpa said, after a moment. The guy said the usual "I'm sorry" line, and left. Yugi's mind was blank, suddenly…

"Are you all right, Yugi?"

Yugi pulled the covers over his head.

"No…"

He felt like shit…

* * *

Anzu didn't hear the rest of what the nurse was saying.

Comatose.

Like in the movies, where someone didn't wake up for years afterwards…sometimes they didn't wake up at all…

Anzu looked at Yami's mother.

She was already crying.

* * *

A/N: Self-sacrifice=not fun, yes?

I've got most of the ending written as of now, so the posts will be much more frequent. Sorry for the four-month pause, but…a part of me didn't want to draw this to a close. I had to force myself to start writing the ending.

But all good things must come to an end. So here we go.

Until next time!

--Trem.


	41. Suspended

A/N: Not much to say.

Chapter 41: Suspended.

* * *

Yugi spent the next couple days in the hospital, staring at the ceiling. He felt as close to fine as he was going to get anytime soon after a day, but they still told him he wasn't fine. They used some ambiguous phrases, mentioned the cold, and told him he was staying a little longer.

And so he was stuck in the same bed in the same room for three days.

It was a very boring existence. He'd stare at the ceiling and think. Nurses would bring him food, and ask him if he needed anything. He'd say no.

Then he'd stare at the ceiling again.

It would have been fine for Yugi before; he would have just asked Grandpa to bring him a book long enough to keep him occupied until they let him go.

Now, though…he felt like a stranger in his own skin. Like he'd already changed, and there was no way he could fit back into the life he'd had before. His mind wouldn't go back to that comfort zone it had before, he knew.

And he _was_ different, technically; he had powers, now. According to the pharaoh, he could see what others couldn't. He could walk through walls, if he wanted to. It was a strange thing to think about while sitting in a normal life, in a normal hospital bed, watching as normal people walked in and out of his room while doing their normal jobs…but there it was.

Being in a normal world still didn't change the fact that he felt like he was dreaming, though. But he didn't think there was anything he could do about that except wait it out.

He asked about Yami. They kept giving him the same answer. On the afternoon of the first day, Yugi had to start facing the possibility that Yami's soul might not be coming back to Yami's body on its own. It was still in existence, he knew—otherwise Yami would be dead by now…

He could be anywhere, though. He could be somewhere Yugi couldn't get to, even with his powers. He could be trapped, just like Atemu said he would be. And Yami had been ready for that, but…

Yugi didn't think anyone else in Yami's life was ready.

By the afternoon of day two, Yugi had come up with a couple of plausible ways to tell everyone what Yami had wanted them to know. This wasn't Yugi's mess to begin with, but…he didn't want it to get any bigger, either. In light of Yami's coma, no one needed any more confusion. On anything.

On the third day, he was let go from the hospital with a cast and crutches. He was told to come back on a regular basis, which Grandpa arranged, to check up on him until he was completely healed. Apparently he'd made the sprain worse by running on it after the initial injury. They mentioned something about tendons, or something. He refused to tell them why he had put his weight on an injured ankle. He told Grandpa after his strange stares while walking awkwardly out to the car that he'd explain later.

The rest of the weekend was silent. Yugi stared at the ceiling of his room. Grandpa did his routine weekend hours in the shop, and cleaning on Sunday.

Grandpa knew Yugi wasn't ready to talk, just yet. After all the effort he'd put into keeping everything _from_ Grandpa…it wasn't easy to think about just letting it all out again.

So neither of them said a word.

Yugi hobbled into school the next Monday, amidst stares and hushed whispers. He didn't pay too much attention. He didn't want to be back in school in the first place, but it was necessary. Finals were within two weeks, and he didn't want to miss finals—he didn't want them on the back of his mind during winter break, which they would be if he had to take them the day before school started again in spring.

Other than that, he really didn't feel like being there anymore. He knew it all already. And if he didn't, there wasn't much to it. His life had been surrounded by textbooks, but…now he felt like if he so much as looked at another book, he'd be sick.

No one made fun of him as he walked through the hallways to homeroom. No one said anything during homeroom. Any other time it would have confused Yugi, but now he was just glad this anomaly had taken place, and left it at that. Figuring out why it was happening was just going to have to wait later for analysis.

He came into World History just as the bell rang, amidst more stares.

"What happened to you?" Mr. Dither asked.

Yugi paused.

For some reason, he hadn't been expecting anyone to ask that. He didn't have a response made up and ready to deliver, like he usually would.

"Long story," he said. Mr. Dither seemed surprised at Yugi's tone, but he nodded.

"That's all right—we probably don't have time for long stories anyway, since we need to review!"

He whipped out a stack of papers from off his desk, and held it up for the class to see. It looked like an ominous set of worksheets.

"Aw, man!" Joey's voice came from the back.

"Yes!" Mr. Dither said, "this is a very large, extensive review that will probably make people's heads hurt. However, it will get you completely ready for the final if you do everything…"

Yugi hobbled over to his seat, unperturbed. He knew he knew everything they had gone over and then some. Doing the packet would probably take up an evening of his time, nothing more. After that, it was the final project, which was almost done thanks to him…looks like he'd be turning that in by himself, too…

Before he sat down, he caught Kaiba's eye. Kaiba stared back, emotionless. Yugi reached into his pocket, and pulled out what he had written on some notepad a nurse brought him while in the hospital.

"Here."

Blue eyes flicked down to the blue paper.

"What's this?" he asked, reaching out for it.

"Read it."

Kaiba unfolded the note, and read the few sentences written inside. He looked at the empty seat in front of him.

"All right," he said.

Yugi shifted off his crutches and sat down, saying,

"And tell An—"

"I will," Kaiba cut off, folding the paper again.

Yugi ignored the strange stares, and proceeded to analyze the study guide as it got passed to him. It was just as he thought it was going to be…

The rest of the school day was pretty much the same; people asked questions, Yugi deflected them with a finalizing, serious tone that had people giving him more strange stares; they seemed like didn't know what to think. He didn't mean to sound aggressive about it, but that's how it seemed to come out. He zoned out in class, not really paying attention to much of anything.

For once, he was lost in his own world.

Not like that was an improvement, considering the circumstances…

* * *

After the last bell, he hobbled out on his crutches to the back of the school where Anzu and Kaiba were waiting. It was awkward, as he made his way up to them. He'd already gotten tired of how slow these things were compared to normal walking.

"Hi," he said, when he'd come close.

"Hi," Anzu said quietly. Kaiba simply looked up, his eyes following Yugi as he went to sit on Anzu's other side.

"What's this about?" Anzu asked, as Yugi situated himself the low brick, putting his crutches to the side. He looked behind; they were all sitting on the edge of a flower bed. It was full of frozen dead things, now.

"Yami," Yugi said simply.

"What about him?" Kaiba asked.

"How he ended up in a coma."

Two pairs of eyes glued themselves to Yugi.

"…What happened after you passed out?" Anzu asked. It sounded like she'd been wanting to ask the question for the past five days.

Yugi only gave them the important parts of the story—the parts that made everything make sense. He stared at the trees beyond the end of the pavement as he talked, forcing himself not to look over at Kaiba or Anzu. When he got to the very end, where Yami had told him he needed to leave…his speech got slower. He shoved down whatever feelings were surging inside, and rattled off the words that had been etched in his mind since they were spoken:

"He said…that if anyone is going to die from all of this, it should be him. Not even his family was worth not doing this. I wasn't a part of this curse to begin with, so I shouldn't be trapped in the same way. No one knew what was going to happen after the curse got broken, and it was very likely that we would both end up trapped in that world without Atemu or Set, who knew how to get out. Or that world could have disappeared. I still don't know what happened. I left before he actually did it. That's when I woke up in the hospital."

Yugi looked over at them, despite himself. Anzu had her hand over her mouth. She looked like she was about to cry. Kaiba was staring at the concrete. Yugi didn't think he'd moved since he'd started narrating in the first place.

No one said anything for a long moment. Yugi looked up at the sky and the downtown buildings in the distance, at the edge of the park that wrapped around the track. The wind blew.

"Anyway," he finally said, "He told me some things that he wanted certain people to know. And I guess I need to tell them now, just in case he never _can_ get back…"

"Who did he leave messages for?" Kaiba asked.

"Bakura, his parents…and you, Kaiba."

Kaiba looked up at the mention of his name. He seemed confused.

"…Really?"

Yugi nodded.

"Yeah."

"…What did he say?" Kaiba's tone sounded cautious, as he asked the question.

Yugi repeated the words, again not really thinking about what they meant.

"He wanted to apologize. If he had known what the curse was doing to you…he would have acted differently. He wanted to thank you, too. I don't know for what, though…"

Kaiba suddenly became fidgety as Yugi talked, and he clasped his hands together, focusing on them too much.

"Don't worry," he said quietly, "I know what he's talking about."

"How were you connec—" Anzu began to ask, but Kaiba cut her off.

"It's not important," he said.

The statement was so stern that neither of them pressed it any further.

"I need to tell Bakura something, too," Yugi said, changing the subject, "And Yami's parents…."

It was decided between Yugi and Anzu that they would pay Yami's parents a visit. Anzu knew where they lived. Kaiba didn't give any more input, and muttered something they both assumed was a goodbye when they finally got up and went home. Neither of them said anything about it.

Yugi made his solitary way back home in the twilight, thinking of what he was going to say to Yami's parents when he and Anzu went over tomorrow. His first thought was that he didn't want to do it. He forced himself to think about what to say, though, just for the sake of being prepared.

Finally the game shop came into view down the street. Grandpa was outside, wiping the windows down. Yugi had yet to figure out why he did that in the evening; he'd never asked…

Grandpa waved, when he saw Yugi. Yugi would have normally waved back, but he decided to skip it; if he stopped, he was sure he wouldn't want to start again. His arms were sore, and he figured out a while ago that he should have waited for the bus…

"Hi," he said, when he was close enough.

"Hello," Grandpa said, swirling the rag around on the glass door, "How was school?"

Yugi managed the best shrug that he could.

"That's not much of an answer," Grandpa said, after a moment.

Yugi looked at his feet.

"It's…been a long five days, that's all."

"I would agree."

Yugi stood where he was, listening to the sounds of Grandpa rubbing the glass until it squeaked.

"So much grime around here," he said, in an attempt to break the silence, "I could swear to you there wasn't this much every evening when I opened this place…"

Yugi forced out a laugh.

"There's a lot more people here than there were 20 years ago. And cars."

"More than that, now. We celebrated 20 years two years ago."

Grandpa stepped back, giving the storefront a good inspection.

"Well," he said, "Looks clean enough! I got all the kids' fingerprints, anyway…"

Yugi nodded absently, as Grandpa picked up the other rag he'd brought out with him. Suddenly, Yugi felt a hand on his shoulder. A part of him was expecting to see Atemu when he looked up, but large, purple eyes met him instead.

It was almost startling.

"Let's go upstairs," Grandpa said. "It's time we talked. I know you like to keep things to yourself, but…" his large eyes finished his sentence, eying Yugi's cast and crutches.

Yugi nodded. He understood.

…Strangely enough, there was a part of him that was curious as to how this was going to turn out. He'd already explained how the curse ended…but he'd never told anyone how it had started. Or just how he'd gotten involved. He didn't quite know how it all was going to come out again.

They sat down at the kitchen table after Grandpa had closed up the shop, and Yugi had gotten all the way up the stairs with Grandpa's help. Grandpa then pushed his papers for work aside, so that he could see Yugi entirely from across the width of the long table. They were only about three feet from each other, but it always seemed like more.

Except for now.

"So," Grandpa said, clasping his hands together. Yugi shifted in his seat. Stared at the table.

"How did you get fractured ribs that ended up healing on their own again?"

The first thing that came to Yugi's mind was Atemu standing over that spot on the lawn, holding his hand out.

"_I am seeing…memory…"_

Yugi took a deep breath.

"I, um…you remember Joey, right?…"

Three hours and two glasses of water later, Yugi was telling Grandpa about finding Yami inside the world of the heart and mind, and the memory pool. He probably spoke more that night than he usually did in a year. What was even more strange was that he didn't really think about it; the words just kept falling out, and the story kept getting longer and more complete. It was all right there, sitting right in his head, waiting to be told; from a quarter of the way through the semester until now, it had been lining up subconsciously, ready, filling up Yugi's mind until this one breaking point, this now, this rush of released tension and confusion, feelings he didn't know were down there…everything was coming out. And everything was a lot.

Somewhere around dinnertime, Yugi felt himself slowing down. The dam was broken, and the waters were even. He felt emptied.

"…and that's where I'm going tomorrow, after school. Then we'll have to tell Bakura sometime…unless Yami wakes up through some miracle…"

Yugi took another sip of water from his glass—only to find that it was empty.

"Oh."

He looked at Grandpa. Large, purple eyes stared back at him.

"That's…it," he said.

Grandpa didn't respond. Yugi didn't have to ask him why he wasn't saying anything; he was thinking it over, letting it sink into his brain. He wouldn't talk again for the rest of the evening, probably.

"I'm going to be in my room."

Yugi then got up and hopped into the kitchen, taking his empty glass with him. He heated up some leftovers and hopped down the hallway to his room. It felt good to leave his crutches at the dinner table. It almost felt like he was fine again, when he was sitting at his desk.

His side still hurt, where Joey had kicked it. He wondered if it would ever go away completely—after all, when people broke bones, they never were the same afterwards. Did that mean he was going to get arthritic in the chest, or something strange like that?

Probably, knowing his luck.

He'd be a sour old man with a hurting chest. Sounded great.

Yugi found himself staring out at the cold evening as he ate, watching the sun set on the iced houses across the street. He hadn't done that in a while.

He didn't think he'd ever felt this…distanced while doing it, though.

Distanced and awkward.

* * *

School came and went too quickly the next day, for Yugi, and soon he was making his way to the front of the school, where Anzu was waiting. Again, people stared as they made their slow way down the street. Yugi wondered why; was it really that strange to be walking around on crutches…?

The walk wasn't that long; neither Yami nor Anzu lived that far from the school, which Yugi was thankful for; his arms were really not liking being stuck out at an odd angle like this all the time…

They didn't have to say much, when they got to the front door. They recognized Anzu from the hospital, and when she started to talk about the curse they invited them in.

Yugi felt like his stomach was turning inside out, when he cross the threshold…

And so they all sat down, and Yugi started talking. He didn't know when he was done. He just remembered staring at what little tea was left in the bottom of the cup that Mrs. Atemuryoku had given him. He'd never felt so awkward in his life.

"…And that's pretty much it."

The atmosphere was stifling.

Yami's father shifted in his seat. Yugi and Anzu looked at him. His mother had gone in the other room a while ago—around the same time as Yugi had started to explain how he had been forced to leave before the curse was broken.

"Yugi….right?"

Yugi nodded mutely.

"I, um…" He trailed off. Fiddled with his cup. Finally, just as Yugi was thinking of trying to excuse himself out of there, he spoke again.

"You said that you got in and out of the necklace…with a power that the pharaoh's spirit gave you?"

Again, Yugi nodded. He tried not to predict what was coming next.

"What is it, exactly?"

Yugi felt Anzu's eyes on him.

"Um…" he told the ground, "It's…kind of weird, but…I can basically see things that others can't—like ghosts, and things. And I can travel to other places—like the one that I was in before. I…I open doors to them, essentially."

"And that's how you got around inside that world?" Anzu asked.

Yugi nodded.

"I had to do it, because Atemu had given the power to me. He couldn't do it anymore."

"…Why give it to you, though?" Yami's dad asked.

Yugi shrugged.

"I don't know," he said, "He said that I would use it well."

"Maybe it was insurance," Mr. Atemuryoku said. He was staring at the floor, frowning. His hands were clasped so tightly together that his knuckles were white.

Yugi felt his stomach harden.

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"Well," Mr. Atemuryoku said, "If Yami is trapped somewhere…you would be able to find him, even after the curse was gone."

He'd predicted it. Next thing they would be asking him to go looking for him. He knew they would ask that, it only made sense, and a part of Yugi wanted to; he'd already thought about it. A lot. But…

"I don't know where to look," Yugi said, "There are a million places he could be…and there's no guarantee that I would come back, either. Atemu and Set were very, very powerful—but even at that, they couldn't break out of the curse on their own. Who's to say I wouldn't run into something just as powerful?"

Yami's dad nodded as Yugi talked.

"That's true," he said.

Yugi and Anzu then watched awkwardly as Yami's dad put his hand over his eyes, as though he were collecting himself. _Please don't break down_, Yugi found himself thinking, _I don't need to see you break down, this is ugly enough as it is…_

Yugi stared at the carpet again. He wanted so badly to just walk out and never look back…

"Thank you," He said, after a while. His voice was different, and his eyes were a little more glassy than they were before.

Yugi nodded.

"You're welcome," he heard himself say.

After that, some awkward goodbyes were choked out and they were led to the door. Yugi was given Bakura's number scribbled onto a sticky note, from the fridge, underneath their own number. Yugi shoved it into his pocket before shaking Yami's father's hand. He and Anzu had to grapple with the door to get it shut all the way, which was awkward in itself, considering the house was old, and the stairway wasn't big enough for two people. Then Anzu had to help Yugi and his crutches get down the steep, narrow steps without falling.

Finally they were on the sidewalk, amidst silence like Yugi never wanted to experience again in his life. He stared at nothing, not really thinking about anything.

"Yugi."

Yugi blinked, and looked up. They were standing at a corner.

"You're about to walk into a main street."

As if on cue, a large truck blasted by them. Yugi watched the blur.

"Oh," he said, after it had roared past.

"…Are you going to be all right?"

The words jogged him into clearer thought. Of course he was fine.

"Y-yeah," he managed.

Anzu was giving him a skeptical look.

"You don't look fine," she said.

"I'm fine," Yugi insisted. Somehow the thought of her helping him anymore was beyond his realm of comprehension. "I'll take the bus."

Anzu kept looking at him.

"….What?" Yugi finally asked.

She shook her head.

"Nothing," she said. "Just thinking."

"Oh."

Another silence stretched out between them. Anzu seemed to be frozen where she was.

"See you at school," Yugi finally forced out, the phrase sounding robotic, devoid of any sincerity.

"Oh…yeah," she said, shaking her head, "Good luck on finals."

Then they both turned, and went in opposite directions. If his arms hadn't been so sore, Yugi was sure he wouldn't have waited to catch the bus.

By the time he had gotten off at his stop, all he wanted to do was hide in a hole somewhere for about a year…

Icky didn't begin to cover it.

Yugi came down the block, deciding that taking the bus was much better than just suffering through the achiness of upper arms. He saw Grandpa outside again, armed with cleaning solution and a rag. That was two days in a row Yugi had caught Grandpa cleaning the windows. It was a strange feeling; he never was home this late, usually…

"There's someone inside," Grandpa said when he got close, nodding towards the shop.

"A customer?" Yugi asked, confused. Grandpa's hours ended a while ago, and it was almost dark...

But Grandpa shook his head.

"No," he said casually, "he's a friend of yours."

Yugi frowned. The only person that knew where Yugi lived was that kid that had been at school for a year before he moved away. He couldn't have bothered to come back and visit; he'd need a spine for that, first…

Cautiously, Yugi leaned forward so he could see through the window display in front. He didn't recognize the man right away, but a pang of familiarity seized him simultaneously.

Strange…

"Oh—here," Grandpa said, opening the door.

"Thanks…" Yugi muttered, trying to figure out who…

He was standing in the center of the shop, idly staring at the puzzles and games on display. He wasn't very tall—a little taller than grandpa. He had nondescript jeans on, and a baggy gray shirt. Despite the casual appearance he stood tall, back straight, hands behind his back as his large eyes fell on Yugi.

Mahogany eyes.

Yugi shook his head; he was seeing things. This guy looked Indian, or something.

"Um…Hi," he said awkwardly, looking the man up and down. He was wearing ratty sneakers.

"You do not recognize me?" The man asked, following Yugi's eyes.

His voice even sounded the same…

"N-no," Yugi said, "I don't."

"I did," Grandpa said; apparently he still had the door open, "you told me about him."

The man laughed at Yugi's bewildered expression.

"When did I—?"

"Maybe if I am in different clothing, you recognize me," he looked down at himself. His hair was pulled back. It was long, thick, and black.

"_A—Atem?_" Yugi forced the name out, hardly believing it…

* * *

A/N: ...or IS IT?

Next chapter will be up soon. Working on it right now, actually. I'm thinking I'll end at 44 chapters, including an epilogue...we'll see how things go.

--Trempush


	42. Release

A/N: I feel like chapters are like cells dividing; they grow and grow and then when they're big enough they divide into two chapters.

Not that that was geeky, or anything…

Chapter title: Release

* * *

Yugi swayed on his crutches; if they weren't there, he probably would have fallen over.

"Yugi!" Atemu exclaimed, running over and steadying him.

"Here," Grandpa's voice said. Yugi saw him walking around them and over to the counter at the back of the shop where the cash register was. He felt like his head had imploded...

Was he dreaming?

"Sit down, Yugi," Grandpa said, putting the stool they kept back there down next to him. Yugi didn't try to resist as they both guided him over, took his crutches out from under him, and helped him onto it. He didn't know why, but all of what little energy he had left just seemed to have vanished...

"Maybe I should not have come," he heard Atemu's voice say, "I do not realize he is not well..."

"He just came back from telling Yami's parents about what happened," Grandpa said.

"_Oh_..."

"Yugi?"

Grandpa and Atemu knelt down in front of him. He stared at them both, willing the bluriness around the edges of his vision to stay there.

"How do you…" he managed to say, turning to Grandpa.

"How do I what?"

Yugi shook his head. It hurt, suddenly…

"How..." he began again, "Do you know who he...is...?"

Grandpa and Atemu exchanged glances.

"Well," Grandpa said, "when he came in, he introduced himself."

"But he's dead—"

"That's what I said," Grandpa said, "and he told me that his friend Set gave him a new body. So here he is."

Yugi looked to Atemu.

"Is true," he said, nodding, "I am thinking about ever since it happen, when I am wake up here, and this is only way that I can come back like this. This has to be way."

Yugi just gawked at him. This didn't make _any_ sense…

"I'm going to get another chair," Grandpa said, standing up again. He was halfway across the room when Yugi forced out,

"Then…you don't think…you actually believe…?"

Grandpa stopped, and turned around.

"You wouldn't have come up with something that elaborate just to explain fractured ribs and a sprained ankle, Yugi," he said.

Yugi just started at him, dumbfounded. No questions about anything? Just accept the supernatural and welcome it as it walks into the game shop and asks where Yugi is? What about mom…?

"I'll be right back," Grandpa was saying.

He then went to the back of the shop, and up the stairs to their small living space.

"I should have wait to come," Atemu repeated, "I do not know you are giving message to them."

"It wasn't really much of a message," Yugi found himself saying automatically, staring absently at the shelves in front of him, "I ended up just telling them what happened. I didn't tell them that Yami wanted to say sorry. I probably should have," Yugi added, upon reflection.

"That is what they want to know," Atemu said, "This is good enough."

"Here." They both looked over to see Grandpa coming into the game shop with one of the dining room chairs. He set it down in front of Yugi.

"I've got some work to do, so I'll be upstairs."

"Oh, this is for me?" Atemu asked, looking surprised.

"Yes," Grandpa said, "I'll keep the door open, in case anything else happens."

"I will say, if he is fall over again," Atemu said.

Grandpa left, leaving the door open to the upstairs.

There wasn't much conversation, after that. Atemu tried to get Yugi to talk again by commenting on different items around the game shop. Yugi didn't answer. He was trying to get his head to stop hurting...he'd felt immensely better, after sitting down on the stool, but he still felt lightheaded...like he had been hanging upside down for a while...

Was this really all just shock?

"Strange names," Atemu mused. He'd sat down and turned so that he his side was against he back of the chair. He was looking at the board games stacked on the shelf next to him. "I see many different name, over time, for same game. Is interesting."

He then tried to pronounce some of the name he saw on the sides of the boxes. The name 'Checkers' seemed to give him problems.

After about ten minutes of listening to Atemu's unbroken miscellaneous monologue, Yugi finally asked the most burning question on his mind:

"…_Why_?"

"Eh?" Atemu asked. He set the rubix cube they had on display back in its stand.

"You've been alive for three thousand years," Yugi explained, as Atemu turned to face him, "…why would he bring you back like that?"

Atemu's eyes narrowed in thought.

"I think…he feel bad," He said, "about what he do, in past. He and I suffer, for so long…maybe this is gift. That I live in body, free of curse …because I am not dead yet, I think he can do this. Nothing else make sense."

Yugi let the information work on his mind. A part of him was still reeling from the shock of seeing someone he thought dead and gone appearing before him, but another part of his brain was on overdrive, trying to make it work logically. And it would have made sense; Set seemed sneaky like that…he probably understood everything that they were saying around him, he just didn't let anything on. He probably thought that, deep down, Atemu would have liked living without the curse better than just dying…whether it was true or not was a different story, though.

Yugi frowned.

If it _were_ true, though...did that mean…?

"What about Yami?"

Atemu shook his head sadly.

"I do not know," he said, "I try to look," he held up his hand, as though he were holding it against a wall, "but I do not find."

He looked at his hands.

"My magic is not strong. I do not feel it…my body do not know magic, it will have to learn again. The only way I use magic now is if I am outside body."

"oh," Yugi said.

"I do not know if Set do anything," Atemu continued, "He do this to me, but it does not mean he do something to Yami. Maybe he know he will not die, and so he do nothing."

"It just seems strange…" Yugi said, "that he would let Yami—die…and give you a new body."

"It seem strange that I _have_ body," Atemu said. "I say it is Set that do this, but…maybe it is not…maybe is accident."

He was examining his hands again, looking extremely confused.

"It is strange that this happen. It make me think…I do not want to be the one that live…if Yami do not live," he said quietly.

The revelation was followed by silence; Yugi couldn't think of anything to respond with. He looked at the storefront. The sun must have been setting just as he had gotten home; it was completely dark outside, now, and the glass was reflecting the indoor lights of the shop like a mirror. The image seemed strange to Yugi; he wasn't used to seeing the shop from that angle reflected back at him—especially when he was in it.

"It is sad," Atemu repeated. He sounded like he was talking more to himself than to Yugi. "I do not know what to do, now…I am here…what do I do?"

The cold night was creeping in through the glass; Yugi could feel the draft washing over his good foot. He remembered why he didn't like coming down here, during the winter.

"If Yami's in a coma…that means he's still alive somewhere," Yugi said, turning back to face Atemu.

"Yes," Atemu replied, "But where…it can be so many place…"

He trailed off, looking helpless for the first time in the few months Yugi had known him. It seemed like an eternity, now…

"We should still try to look for him," Yugi found himself saying, "and now that you're here, it would make things easier…"

He trailed off; Atemu was shaking his head.

"You do not know how long it will take," he said. "What if you cannot come back? What if he is trap somewhere, and you cannot reach him? What if his soul is damage, and is not same? There are so many thing…it is impossible to say that you or I can bring Yami back so that he is same. It is possible to find him, but we do not know if he will be same."

Yugi looked down.

"I...said something kind of like that to Yami's parents."

"Oh," Atemu said, "What do they say?"

Yugi noticed he was clamping his hands together tightly.

"Mr. Atemuryoku started crying."

"Oh," Atemu said quietly. "He is probably blame himself. I see him, through necklace. He want to not give Yami necklace, more than anything else. But he have to. Now, it is because of curse that Yami is not here. This is how he is thinking."

Yugi nodded, for a lack of anything else to do. He stared at his feet.

"So what have you been doing the past five days?" He asked; he suddenly wanted to get to a different subject, and it was another of the myriad of questions that had exploded out of nowhere when he'd walked in the game shop door.

"I stay with Kaiba," Atemu said.

Yugi blinked. He hadn't expected that…

"Really?"

"When I come here," Atemu said, "I am in street. I think I am in death first, and I am confuse—it is just like life, outside my prison. I see I am near Kaiba's house. I remember from memory what place look like—this is how I know where I am. Is cold, and is only place I recognize—so I come to his door, and explain. He listen, and understand when I mention curse. I stay with him. He give me clothes," he looked down at himself again, "But he do not say from where. He is living in house so big, and all of his family leave behind things when they die—it is hard to say who has what, even for him. He do not remember everything. He find box, and he see clothes that are small. So he give them to me. They are not small on me."

"So you've been there…the entire time since the curse broke?" Yugi asked. The story was staring to become coherent—kind of...

"Yes," Atemu said, "I tell him not to tell anyone I am here; I want to think for a while. I am confuse, so I have to think. He leave me alone. He has much to do, because he is alone in house now. He live with his uncle, who give in to demon completely. When demon and Set die, his uncle die as well. He come home after curse break and find him, he is dead. He is last family left. Now Kaiba is alone. So he is going through belonging that no one see since his father and brother die, three year ago…"

Atemu shook his head.

"It is sad story. But I do not want to tell everything."

He sighed.

"very sad…"

Yugi didn't say anything for a moment. It _did _sound like Set had done it...but they would never know for sure unless Set gave himself a new body too, and could just tell them...

Somehow, Yugi didn't think that was the case.

"So now....you're just here? For good?"

Atemu gave out a short laugh.

"I am as in life," he said, "I will be old, and die. Like everyone will. I am no longer in box."

As he spoke, Yugi had the thought that if this really was Set's doing and Yami didn't wake up, Set's obvious intention of Atemu being happy would be lost.

It was a stretch, but if Set had had time to think that far ahead...maybe he had solved that problem, too. Yugi hoped so, anyway...

"I told Kaiba what Yami told me," Yugi said.

"Message, you mean?"

"Yeah."

"How do he respond?"

Yugi shrugged.

"He said he understood what I meant when I told him the message. He didn't say much, after that."

"Oh," Atemu said, knowingly, "He is doing that a lot now."

"Not saying much?"

"yes," Atemu said, "He has lot to think about. I am worry what happen to him after curse. He have hard life for past three year, and it is heavy on him."

"...What's happened to him?" Yugi asked. "You just said his father and brother died, but...how was he connected to the curse?"

Atemu shook his head.

"Is long," he said, "I tell Yami because he need to know, to understand. I do not want to tell now, though. It is Kaiba's memory. You ask him, not me."

"So I'll never know," Yugi translated.

Atemu smiled weakly.

"He is very, ehm…Oh, it begin with 's'…"

"Stubborn?" Yugi offered.

"Yes. He is stubborn," Atemu repeated, stumbling over the last part of the word. If Yugi had been in a better mood, he would have found it funny.

However, he simply stared at his feet, lost in thought. The minutes dragged on.

"You are thinking hard," Atemu said, after a while. "What are you thinking?"

Yugi didn't answer right away. He felt like Atemu's voice was floating to him from a large distance, barely understandable.

"I'm…thinking about Yami," Yugi said, answering truthfully.

"Ah," Atemu said, his tone heavy again. "We all are doing this. In different way, we think."

Another silence. That nagging feeling he'd tried to get away from before resurfaced in Yugi's mind; that desperate feeling he'd felt at Yami's house was coming back, as though it were suddenly unleashed by some trigger Yugi hadn't noticed…this _couldn't_ be the right answer…

He took a deep breath; he needed sleep…

"Do not think about it, Yugi," Atemu said, his voice gentle.

"How can I _not_ think about it!?" Yugi snapped.

They looked at each other for a moment; he caught Atemu by surprise. Yugi hadn't meant to yell, but…it had just come out that way.

He was staring to see what had been propelling him to snap at people at school, the past few days.

He shook his head.

"Sorry, I just…"

"It is not fair," Atemu said, "that we are here, and he is not." He looked at Yugi, "Is this what you are thinking?"

Yugi nodded, trying to will the knot in his chest to go away—but it only got bigger. When Yugi spoke next, he felt like the feeling was bursting out of him—

"There _has_ to be a way to find him!"

Atemu looked surprised again; he hadn't been expecting that, either. Yugi blundered on, voicing what he hadn't realized he'd been thinking at all…

"This can't—we _have_ to look, we can't just let him sit there because we might not be able to get back!" His voice was getting louder, echoing off the walls of the shop. All he could think about, suddenly, was getting this out before it exploded inside. "What about him?! His parents, they're not ready for this, _no one_ was ready for this! Kaiba, he—he looked like he was barely holding himself together! Anzu's been crying, I don't even know about Bakura, but he can't be fine, and—It's just not—! He's shouldn't just _die_ like this—!"

His throat was closing up. He felt hot, and he didn't know why. It was supposed to be cold down here—

"Why are you looking at me like that?!"

For Atemu was looking at him, a pained sympathy emanating from him as he watched Yugi spit out what jagged phrases he could force himself to voice.

"_Why you_?" Yugi strangled out. He swallowed; "I mean, nothing against you, but _how_ many lifetimes have you been around?! At least—if I was there, we could of—We could have done something, anyway! We're basically abandoning him, and he's got—I mean, shit, he has _parents_! That _remember_ him!"

"Yugi!" Atemu said, shocked, "You are crying!"

Yugi's hand flew up to his face.

"shit…"

He furiously wiped the wetness away from his eyes.

"Yugi…" Atemu said again; Yugi felt a hand on his shoulder.

He tried to fight it; he pulled back, putting his face in his hands and curling into himself, as small as he could possibly fit. He heard Atemu consoling him, but it felt a million miles away. The only thing close to Yugi was the shock, the pain, and the acknowledgment that everything _had_ had an effect on him. He wasn't a bystander; he had been just as much a part of this as everyone else from the moment he agreed to help Atemu, all that time ago.

He, too, felt the hole that was left behind. He saw it in everyone's face, in their eyes, in the way they spoke, and it was slowly working its way through Yugi, tearing him apart. Perhaps he wasn't feeling the gap as much as Yami's parents, or Bakura, or even Kaiba. But he'd still known Yami, and it reminded him too much of what his own mind had taken him through, after Dad died, after Mom left. And after all this time of trying to swallow it, to cover it up, to tell himself that he didn't really care, that he wasn't a part of this, that he was only in the background…here he was, feeling it all come back to him in one huge rush. Here he was, crying. Crying in front of someone else for the first time in he didn't even know how long...

"If you do not come back, that is two lives," Atemu was saying in a pained voice, "It is sad that he is gone like this, but if you go in state you are now, you will not find anything! If you act on emotion only, or mind only, and use magic…you will end up trap in terrible place. That is mistake that Set make, that is how curse is form in beginning! He is angry, he let this guide him. You _can not _make same mistake," Atemu said, giving Yugi's shoulder a shake.

Yugi sniffed; he seemed to be starting to calming down, now.

"You cannot control when one die or another die because this is how it should be. This is not way to think."

Yugi opened his eyes again. The lighting of the shop around him seemed abnormally bright now. He rubbed his face.

"Sorry," he muttered, taking a deep breath through his clogged nose, and looking up again.

"Do not say, it is not bad," Atemu said, "I feel same way. I want to go, and find, and this is what I do before. Is not same, now."

He sighed.

"I am so calm, before...I am thinking I am face death. I have no more to worry. Now, I am here...and I cannot do anything."

Yugi noticed Atemu's hand that wasn't on Yugi's shoulder was clenched into a fist. After a moment, it relaxed.

"You are tired," Atemu said, "You are needing rest."

Yugi nodded, sniffing again.

"Where'd my crutches go?" he asked thickly.

A little while later he was in bed, and Atemu was shutting the door behind him as he left, after making sure Yugi didn't fall and hurt himself while trying to get to his room.

The first thing Yugi's eyes fell on in the dark room was that picture frame, which was still on his desk from when he'd pulled out, the night Atemu first talked to him. All this time it had been sitting there, facedown on the beside table. Forgotten.

He put the picture frame right-side-up again. He fell asleep not long thereafter.

* * *

Atemu walked down the hallway again, into the main area of the small apartment. He stopped when he got to the table, where Yugi's Grandpa was still sitting. He was feigning reading a paper.

"You hear what he say earlier?" Atemu asked quietly.

Slowly, Yugi's Grandpa nodded.

"That is why you keep door open?"

"Yes," he said, putting his paper down, "That's why I kept the door open."

There was a pause, as the two of them stayed where they were.

"I am sorry," Atemu said, finally. He felt Yugi's Grandpa's eyes on him.

"I bring Yugi into this," he continued, "I give him power, and ask him to help...I do not know how it will end, but now, is...too hard. It is hurt him, more than I think. I do not see, when I am trying get curse to break, but...I hurt him, and he keep it in. Yami did same—whole life, he keep it in. It is heavy on him. Now, it is heavy on Yugi, too."

"Yes," Yugi's Grandpa said, "he will definitely be affected by it. He already has been."

Atemu felt his fist clench again.

"I hope it is not all in bad way," he said.

"I hope so too," Yugi's Grandpa said.

"As I understand it," he continued, turning in his chair so that he faced Atemu, "Yami is not likely to come back."

Atemu shook his head.

"It is hard to say," he said, "I do not know what happen. I want to figure out, but...it is like I say to Yugi. If we do not know where he is, and let emotion guide us to what we want to find...we will not find. We will only find what we see. Not what is there. Is dangerous. There is no way to say if can get out again, once we are in."

"Sounds like magic is complicated."

Atemu nodded.

"That is why is given up, I think," he said. "Is common before—I am not special, where I am from. Whole army know how. Everyone is train, in this way. Then, it die out. Now, is make people scare. No one know how to use. It is good thing, I think."

Yugi's Grandpa smiled wanly.

"It's good that magic isn't around anymore?"

"Yes," Atemu said. He looked at his hand again, absently. "Otherwise, curse happen more often."

Yugi's Grandpa nodded. Then, he pushed his chair back.

"Well," he said, "I'm going to get that other chair."

"Oh, I will go to bring—"  
"That's fine," he said, cutting him off, "I brought it down the stairs, I can get it back up. Besides, you probably should start heading back. There are worse parts of town, but things can get sketchy out there after dark..."

They went down to the shop again, where Atemu said goodbye, and made his way to the front. Just as he was about to open the door, he heard,

"You should go see him."

Atemu turned.

"You mean in hospital?" he asked.

Yugi's Grandpa nodded.

"If he passes away soon, it would be a shame if you didn't see him again."

"Yes," Atemu said, after a moment.

"Thank you, for telling me this," he added.

Yugi's Grandpa simply nodded again, picked up the chair, and went back upstairs.

* * *

Atemu found his way back home the same way he left, following the streets as fast as he could. The air was so incredibly cold that he didn't know how anyone could stand to like this kind of weather, even with the snow…

The mansion was very, very empty sounding when he finally got back. He found Kaiba in a storage room upstairs, asleep on the floor next to old boxes full of antique miscellany. It was midnight, at that point. He'd probably been sorting through boxes since he had gotten home from school.

Carefully Atemu reached out and shook his shoulder gently. It didn't take much for Kaiba to wake up again; he was startled by the movement, shoving himself off the floor, eyes wide.

"Oh," he said, when he saw Atemu sitting there, watching. "It's you."

"You do not mean to fall asleep here, yes?" he asked.

Kaiba shook his head, in an attempt to wake himself up a little.

"No," he muttered, "I don't sleep on floors." He grimaced, and put his hand on the side he'd been sleeping on.

"For good reasons…"

"Do you need help to get to room?" Atemu asked. Kaiba shook his head again. He looked around at the mess he'd made.

"I didn't know this room had so much _junk_ in it…it goes deeper than I thought it did…"

Atemu looked around at the stacks of boxes in the narrow room, stretching back to the outside wall of the house.

"It is full of what is valuable to ancestor. Is not junk to them."

"Well it's not like I can ask anyone about it," Kaiba said, standing up, "so—I'm going to just have to sell or give away what I don't recognize, and hope my relatives don't haunt me for it. It's not like I'm using it anyway…a lot of this stuff got packed away when my mother died…"

Atemu didn't reply; he knew exactly what Kaiba was talking about, from the necklace's memories. He didn't want to start commenting on it, though; he didn't want to make Kaiba say any more than he felt like saying, especially now…

"Come on," Kaiba said, stepping out of the room. Atemu followed, shutting the door behind him. Kaiba was already walking down the hallway.

"Yugi and I," he said, "Are going to see Yami, in hospital."

Kaiba halted.

"Do you want to come and see him?"

"…No," Kaiba said. Atemu barely made out the word, he said it so softly.

"It…may be last time—"  
"I don't like hospitals."

"…oh," Atemu said. Then, he added, "If I am find anything…I will say."

"I don't need to hear about it," Kaiba said, in that same quiet voice. "I just need to get out of this dead place. The curse is over and done with. After I graduate, I'm moving out and never looking back."

A silence.

"You've got somewhere to live until then, though. I would suggest getting a job, or something. We could easily make a fake identity—"

"Is not that easy," Atemu interrupted. "Curse is over. But everything surrounding curse...is still inside."

Kaiba turned around. Cold, icy eyes stared at Atemu from further down the old hallway.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"It is meaning that you are still feel. Curse is part of past, now. You are worry for Yami, just like all of us—"

"Why are you telling me this? And while we're talking about this, what exactly did you _tell_ Yami, anyway?"

"Through necklace," Atemu said, "Everything that is connect to curse is keep in memory, of those that see. These memory are store in place, where I am trap. With magic, I pull all memory you have of learning about curse out of this place where memory are store, and let Yami see. I do not tell him what I see before, but he experience, as you remember."

Kaiba looked away, frowning.

"What did he see?" he asked. Apprehension bled out of the restraint.

"It…it is late," Atemu said, "You need to get sleep—"

"What did you show him, Atemu?" Kaiba demanded.

Atemu hesitated. He knew Kaiba wouldn't like it, but…he had to know sometime.

"I am show him two. One is when you hear from father about curse. He tell you why you and your family are angry sometime, and you do not remember. He tell you it is because demon. Then…I show him what happen later, this same night…"

As realization dawned on Kaiba's face, Atemu's heart sank.

"You…_WHAT?!_"

The shout echoed off the walls. Kaiba's eyes were suddenly wide, and angry.

"If I tell him, is not same!" Atemu said, trying to explain himself—

"The _one thing_!" Kaiba shouted, holding up a finger, "The _one_ memory that haunts me more than I could ever put in words, and you went and put _Yami in my head_?!"

"It is for—"

"_Get out_!"

"You must calm—"

"I _said_—!" Kaiba came stalking down the hallway towards Atemu. He grabbed the pharaoh by his shirt front—

In a flash of white light, Atemu had grabbed Kaiba's arm and shoved him away with a force so great that Kaiba found himself flat on his back, three feet away. He coughed; the wind had gotten knocked out of him. Atemu walked over to Kaiba's side.

"What the—" Kaiba coughed, "you said you didn't have powers anymore!"

Atemu kneeled.

"So you are taking chance to attack me?"

Kaiba didn't have a response to that.

"I say that my body do no know," Atemu continued, "Magic is weak, but is not gone. Is part of me, just like mind. It is skill that you control, after you are born."

Kaiba coughed again.

"Oh."

He closed his eyes.

"This is why I do not want to tell you now," Atemu said, looking at Kaiba's spread-eagled position, "You are still recover."

"From _what_?" He snapped, "You don't make sense!"

"Demon is take space inside," Atemu said calmly, "it is now gone. This is why your uncle is die; it take up _too much_ space. When it is gone, there is nothing left. He is empty shell. When inside is taken, shell is very delicate. It fall apart."

Kaiba's breathing had calmed again. He didn't make the effort to get up.

"You are run away from memory," Atemu said gently, after a while. "This is why it is come back, in dream, in nightmare…you only feel fear. You try to control inside, control where demon is trying to hold, by pushing away where demon cannot reach. Now…you cannot push away. But is still there."

"I know," Kaiba said. His voice was weary. Tired. "It's the worst memory I have…"

"Yes," Atemu agreed, "You are fighting all this time, alone. If Yami, who is part of curse as well, feel what you have feel…he will not keep fighting you like he is. You will not keep fighting him like you are. I see you and him, like many before you. It is enough fight, now—for three thousand year, I watch. I want fighting to end. This is why I show him."

A dry laugh escaped Kaiba's throat, and he opened his eyes again.

"So he's going to magically understand everything now?"

"No," Atemu said, smiling at the sarcasm, "but you do not explain to him. I know you will not. But it need to be explain."

Finally Kaiba moved; he looked even more sore than before.

"Well it's not worth anything now," he said, "considering he's in a coma…"

He pulled himself to a sitting position. Atemu realized that he really was quite small for someone in modern times—especially compared to someone as tall as Kaiba. It was an interesting observation.

"He still have chance to wake."

Kaiba shook his head.

"I'm not going keep my hopes up." Then, he grimaced again, rubbing his back.

"Are you sure you're not that strong?"

Atemu laughed.

"I am not _as_ strong," he said, "I am very weak, compare to before curse."

"Geez…"

"I am a god," Atemu said, "This is what I believe, then. I push myself to train, to use skill, because I am god in human body. But," he said, flexing the hand he'd knocked Kaiba over with, "I do not expect this. It seem that it will come, if my will is strong enough. If I train…it will come back.

He stood. "This is for different time. You go rest, now."

He started towards the spare room where he'd been sleeping the past week. Right as he was about to open the door, he heard—

"Sorry."

Atemu turned to see Kaiba standing, his back to Atemu. His arms were crossed.

Atemu smiled. Kaiba certainly was an interesting person.

"Is fine," he said, "I..."

Kaiba was already halfway through the door to his own room. The door clicked shut, finalizing the conversation. Atemu simply smiled again, and went to bed.

* * *

A/N: So! About that whole pharaoh dead thing…yeah. I like him. He kind of evolved into a cool character that I didn't want to kill off. So he gets to stay for one more lifetime. Hehe.

And apparently it wouldn't be a good idea to piss him off, either. O.o

Until next time! (coming up: last chapter!)

--Trempush.


	43. Doors Through Walls

A/N: So here we are, last chapter. What a ride it's been...and sorry to keep you waiting. It really has been a busy couple of months, but now things are winding down enough that I can take the time to finish this and get it posted. I'll be busily working on the sequel week after next, I can assure you :D

Chapter title: Doors Through Walls

* * *

He had said he wasn't going to go. He vividly remembered telling Atemu this the previous evening. He had good reason to get the creeps every time he stepped into a hospital—there were a lot of bad memories there. Especially at Domino Hospital. Nothing good had happened there at any point in Seto Kaiba's life.

So why was it that he'd suddenly changed his mind?

He hadn't really intended on going; he'd just...stepped out of the house for a walk (mostly to get away from Atemu's constant blabbering), and had somehow made his winding way towards the long ugly building. He only realized where he was when he recognized the bushes in front of the emergency room doors. He had even stopped in front of them, glaring at them as though they had lured him here, or had appeared where they shouldn't have been, which was where he was supposed to be—lost in one of the small neighborhoods near his house.

When he'd gotten over his initial shock, he still didn't move. He was caught between stubborn resolve and morbid curiosity, and felt more indecisive the more he thought about it. He was finally embarrassed into going inside when one of the employees had come out and asked Kaiba what he was doing there, and if he needed help.

"No," he'd said, "I'm...here to see someone."

It was better than saying he'd lost his way...

And so, he'd ended up sitting in the large comfortable room they had relocated Yami to, watching him breathe. Repeatedly.

He was glad that Atemu and Yugi hadn't been there; he'd never hear the end of it if they found out he'd come after all, although he didn't understand why it was such a big deal. It's not like Yami would know if anyone had come or not, and he'd seen Yami breathing plenty of times before. Now it just happened to be _all_ he was doing. It was nice to come in from the cold, though; even Kaiba's thick expensive trenchcoat wasn't enough to keep his body completely warm.

So he sat for an indefinite period of time. The noise from the equipment surrounding Yami settled into the background, and the atmosphere became comfortably quiet. He let his mind wander where it wanted to, taking advantage of this strange pause in time he had stumbled upon. When the nurse left he felt like he was in a different world, isolated from even his own mental turmoil. It was as if there were a blanket around him, relaxing him. It was probably because no one else knew he was here...

Or maybe staring at Yami in a coma had a soothing effect on him.

The absurdity of the thought almost made him laugh. Though he was suspicious that the act would feel strange on his face, since it had been a while. He wasn't in a rush to get himself to do it, either, so perhaps it was just out of force of habit now that he kept a straight face.

It was a reminder of how hard things had been for him, since his brother and father had died. He had never had time to think about it before, but the concept had manifested itself

One thing at a time; that's how he'd taken things after Mokuba and father had died, and that's how he was going to take things now. It was the only way to, really, without wanting to throw yourself out a window.

Kaiba was thankful that he was sane enough to know that wasn't a good option. It would be very anti-climactic, after all he'd been through, to end it now. He wasn't even 20 yet, for goodness' sake.

Besides, what if Yami woke up again after all?

The question made Kaiba's stream of consciousness halt for a moment, surprised. He didn't think Yami would, but...what if he did?

Kaiba found himself eying Yami, as though he were going to snap out of it that instant, all better. He shook his head; it would definitely be very, very strange if Yami woke up later. Kaiba would have to be suspicious of leftover curse magic at work, or something like that.

Oh, well.

He'd think about it if it happened; no use sitting here pondering over what if's. Kaiba had learned to abandon those a long time ago, and focus only on what was there—not what could have been. The future was a big blank for him for the same reason; when every day was a fight against yourself, the only thing to hope for was that tomorrow would be easier.

However he was slowly starting to realize, as the week went on, that he didn't need to think like that anymore. His stringent habits of constantly searching for the pull that was always there, and waiting for the urge that was always threatening to come out and eat away at him just a little bit more—they weren't needed. He was starting to understand what Atemu meant, by the demon leaving a hole behind. It made him wonder; did that mean his uncle died of physical stress, or psychological stress? Maybe he was just so worn that he couldn't take anything more than what he was already suffering under...

Not that it mattered now; his uncle was dead now. Kaiba had inherited everything he'd owned, including the house and his business. It was practically running itself at the moment, thank goodness. He was getting calls every once in a while from the substitute his uncle had hired when he was first becoming too weak to go to work. The substitute was practically running the business himself, though, and had been for the past five years. Kaiba suspected it was out of courtesy that he was calling—not out of actual concern, but because feigning so was the right thing to do.

Oh, well. At least he kept Kaiba updated on how things were going. Their stocks were doing well.

Kaiba shifted in his seat. If he hadn't had so much to think about, he probably would have gotten bored a while ago. He looked at Yami again, who predictably looked in about the same condition as last time Kaiba had checked.

"I guess I should say something," he said aloud. His words barely echoed off the walls, absorbed into the dated pastel furniture. The room was kind of ugly, now that he looked at it...

He turned back to Yami.

"People miss you," he continued, saying the first thing that came to mind. It was true; everyone was worrying and crying, hoping he'd snap out of it soon. It was an ugly limbo to be in, for those watching; he wasn't responsive, and there was a chance that he was as good as dead. But everyone was forced to keep holding on, hoping. There was no closure, no ending. Just stagnant pause, with no predictable end in sight.

"You should make up your mind. There's nothing to gain from staying like this."

Kaiba frowned, after he'd spit out the words. Why was he giving Yami advice when Yami couldn't hear him?

Kaiba then decided that it was time to leave; he was getting too much into his head, and was starting to say strange things as a result.

"You mess with me even when you can't do anything," he said, as he got up. "I'm impressed."

Knowing that it would probably be the last time he'd come here, Kaiba took one last glance at the whole setup. There wasn't anything more to see here.

"Good luck," he said as he left.

* * *

It was windy now outside, making Seto get the feeling that he was going to get sick later from spending his time walking. He liked going on long walks too much to stay inside, though. He needed to get rid of the dark thoughts that plagued his mind somehow, when they became too many...

Watching the pavement as it went by underneath his feet, Seto was only barely aware of what was ahead of him. He didn't run into anything, but he didn't see what was coming up from a distance, either—

"Kaiba?"  
Seto halted. Bakura's big brown eyes looked back at him, just as surprised and caught off-guard as Kaiba felt. Bakura actually looked like a man this time—and tired.

"What are you doing over here?" he asked.

It was an honest question. Kaiba didn't feel like returning the honesty at the moment, though.

"Walking," he said shortly.

"Not visiting Yami?"

"He's in a coma," he said, avoiding the question, "It's not like he's going to talk to me."

Bakura's eyes narrowed at the comment, as though Kaiba had personally insulted him.

"It's probably better that he doesn't talk to you, anyway."

"I don't think he's talking to anyone right now, so why would it matter?"

Bakura outright glared at Kaiba.

"You _ass,_" he said, emphasizing the word as tough it were the most horrible name ever, "I don't even know why I'm talking to you."

"You stopped me. I was just going to ignore you."

"I wanted to see if there was at least some human decency in you somewhere, but I guess not."

Seto raised an eyebrow.

"If it really makes you feel better, I was just there. And he really is not talking to anyone."

Bakura frowned.

"Why didn't you just say that in the first place?"

"What, that he's not talking?"

"No!" Bakura snapped, "that you visited Yami!"

Kaiba was silent for moment; he didn't have a response for that.

"Are you always this impossible? No wonder Yami ranted about you!"

"He ranted about me?"

Bakura nodded, eyes wide, as though Kaiba just made himself look stupid for not knowing that.

"Uh—yeah! Duh!"

"You look like a girl when you do that."

"That's not an insult, you know."

"I was just stating the obvious."

"Thanks, I kind of already knew that. This doesn't just come naturally, it takes a bit of practice."

"...Thanks for sharing, I'll keep that in mind."

It threw Kaiba when Bakura laughed.

"Sorry," he said, straightening his face again, "That was funny."

"I don't know how," Kaiba said, stating the truth.

"Probably 'cause you're always snapping at people."

"How do you know what I do all the time?"

"It's not that hard to take a wild guess," Bakura said, putting his hands on his hips, "I mean, really. You look like you smile maybe...once a year?"

"There's not much to smile about," Kaiba said, wondering how it was that he was getting verbally attacked by Bakura one second and getting laughed at the next. His only explanation was that Bakura had gotten weirder over the years....

"There's always something," Bakura said.

"...Why are you talking to me, anyway?" Kaiba asked, avoiding that too, "I thought you hated me."

Bakura shrugged. He suddenly looked awkward.  
"Well," he said, "I've been kind of...talking to Yami's mom and dad, and learning about this whole...curse business...thing..."

Kaiba tried no to look as apprehensive as he felt.

"What did they tell you?"

"Well," Bakura said, shrugging again, "I...heard about all the stuff you did."

Kaiba felt his body tense. Had Atemu gone over there and confessed Kaiba's deeds, or something? If that were the case, Kaiba was going to go postal on his ass—

"Like what?" he asked.

Bakura pulled his jacket tightly around him, trying to stay warm.

"Like...what you actually said to scare Yami away before you left."

Oh yeah. That whole thing. Somehow the happenings at Dalton seemed worlds away now. Kaiba just stared at Bakura; what was he supposed to say to that?  
Bakura looked up, staring Kaiba straight in the eyes.

"He told me you threatened to kill him."

"It would have been the same thing," Kaiba said, evenly, wondering where Bakura was taking this, "unleashing the demon would have killed him."

"Well yeah, but...it makes a little more sense now," Bakura said, "I mean, I thought you were a future criminal before I knew about the curse."

Yeah, he supposed it would.

"That's why you didn't trust me," he stated.

Bakura nodded.

"I thought I was going to have to call the police. And then he told me you told him you didn't mean it—"

"I didn't."

The second he said it, Kaiba wished he could take it back. He didn't need to tell Bakura anything, nor did he want to...

Bakura frowned, eying Kaiba suspiciously.

"That's another thing that didn't make sense," he said, "Why the sudden change? I mean, even though your dad and brother had just died, why tell Yami about the curse then? You didn't say anything before. But he was trying to cheer you up, and make you stop thinking about it, at least for a little bit...but you changed, just like that. You went from...quiet happy smart kid to, 'I'm gong to kill you'. It was as if you just...changed into a different person overnight, and never went back."

"What's your point?" Kaiba asked, after a silence. He was truly amazed that Bakura could be this insightful. He thought there was nothing but shallow girlyness floating around in his head. Yet here he was, figuring out what holes were left behind by the Atemuryoku's side of the story...

Bakura asked his next question hesitantly, as though he doubted himself.

"Did the demon..._only_ affect Yami and his family? Yami's dad said it did, but...it doesn't quite make sense..."

Seto didn't respond right away. First Atemu, and now Bakura, of all people. Just when he wanted to leave it all behind, everyone had to stick their noses into his private business and—

"I'm right, aren't I?" Bakura asked quietly, watching Seto's expression, "the demon...affected you, too, didn't it?"

It seemed like minutes had passed before Seto finally got up the courage to say something. He'd been unexpectedly cornered.

"The demon fed off of anger," Kaiba finally said, thankful that most people were just driving in this weather instead of walking, "My family's anger. It would take until there was nothing left, and we'd die off one by one. My father had the idea of starving it by not giving in to its hold it had on all of us. It worked. Unfortunately, the demon figured out it was my father that started this, and it...killed him and my brother. That meant all the demon's focus was on my uncle, who was useless at that point, and me."

It was strange, hearing himself spitting out what he'd rather keep inside. It was a strange day indeed...

Bakura was speechless, obviously seeing Kaiba under a whole new light now. At least, that's why Seto thought Bakura was gawking at him. Snow had started to fall again, at some point. It was clinging to Bakura's knit hat, making it look like it was covered in pom-poms. If Seto was feeling less tired, he'd make a comment about how comical he looked at the moment. As it was, he decided, it would be better to just go home. He needed to warm up, anyway...

"I need to get going," he said, breaking the silence, "I've...got some cleaning to do."

He walked past Bakura, and started down the street again. Not long after, he heard footsteps behind him, and a hand grab his elbow.

"Wait!" Bakura stopped next to him.

"...Can I help?"

Seto stared at him for a moment, caught off-guard.

"With cleaning my stuff out of closets?" Kaiba clarified.

Bakura's grip on his elbow slackened, but he didn't let go completely. He looked even more awkward than he did before.

"Well, I mean...I don't know, I just...figured it would be a nice thing to do—"

"So you hear about how I was affected, and now you're feeling sorry," Kaiba translated.

Kaiba thought his head was going to get bitten off for that, but...strangely enough, Bakura just sighed.

"I can't talk to anyone about this," he said, "I guess...I'm kind of confused—well, I mean, the story makes sense, now, but..." he trailed off, staring at the slushy pavement under his feet.

Kaiba felt himself relax, as he understood. Bakura felt lost in all the facts and realizations, as everything was coming together in his mind. He finally had the entire picture—and he didn't know what to do with it.

Kaiba remembered that feeling. It had been a long time, but...he hadn't forgotten.

"It's dusty," Kaiba said, "I haven't been in some parts of the house for over five years."

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Bakura smile a little.

"That's fine," he said.

Kaiba turned.

"Follow me."

And so they walked through the falling snow towards Kaiba's mansion in silence, each of them lost in their own wandering thoughts.

Together.

* * *

A/N: So there it is. Short, but I didn't want to write more angstiness, and you know what's going to happen when Atemu and Yugi go to the hospital—more angstiness. I figured I'd end on a bittersweet note instead of an overdramatic one. Maybe I went the other way, but hey, that's how it is now. So there.

Now it's 12:04 as I write this, four minutes past the day I wanted to post this. It will now be 'the story was completed in five years and a couple minutes'. Can't win 'em all, I guess. (EDIT: I've been told that the site still counted it as December 1st! Woo hoo!)

Anyway, I will respond to reviews in the morning (I need sleep, I've got to study for my finals...), and get cracking on that epilogue of mine. Expect Bakura becoming more himself again. And Kaiba being afraid for his sanity, for entirely different reasons.

On the note of what I'm going to do in the future (since I remember people asking): in addition to this sequel, I've got some other genres of fanfic I've been working on, including Kingdom Hearts stuff (AKUROKU OMGLOL) and possibly Vocaloid, if I can get that idea up and running. I've had ideas for these two fandoms, but I've committed myself to writing this one through to the end before posting anything else. As a result, I've got a LOT of written stuff just hanging out on my hard drive that I can finally post. So expect to see a lot of stuff coming from me now. After Finals week, of course.

So before this author's note becomes longer than the actual chapter (do they still have rules/come after you for that on ffnet?) I'm going to stop typing, get this thing uploaded, and go to bed.

Happy reading, wherever your adventures take you next! I will go into thank you's etc. in the epilogue author's note, since you all deserve so much thanks!

--Trempush


	44. Epilogue

A/N: Allrighty, epilogue time! It's very short, I know, but it's basically just a blurb of what's to come—the first part of the first chapter, word for word, of the Doors Through Walls sequel. Happy New Year, everyone!

Chapter title: Epilogue

* * *

"Hey guys! Get over here, you need to see this! I found what was causing the system to go haywire!"  
Footsteps.

"What was it—?"

"Oh, no! We were too late!"

"Hold on, he's not dead yet. See?"

"Wait—but the signal's still there! So_ this_ guy's..."

"The one making the system think we're in trouble. Weird, ain't it?"

"...Very..."

Silence. Shuffling.

"He _seems_ normal enough..."

"What I wanna know is how this sucker's still alive. It's way too dangerous out here for anyone's own good. He shoulda been eaten alive hours ago."

"Ooh! He's freezing!"

"If he's alive, he's not very."

"Should we take him back?"

"Don't see why not. I have to figure out why he's makin' my system go on the fritz."

"Here, help me pick him up—not you."

"Why not? I can do it!"

"Don't worry, I got it, I ain't that old, yet. All right, one...two...three—!"

* * *

He first realized he was aware. Fragments of thoughts, hints of cognitive connections started to spark in his consciousness, spinning what few threads of input he had into a strange, abstract picture.

He was….here. Something, some small epiphany, told him he was here.

Where was here?

Noise. He heard noise.

Machines. Clothes. Bed. Sheets—

Light. Wherever here was, it was bright. He felt his eyelids, aware of how they were closed. They twitched. They were working.

He heard breathing. His finger moved. He wanted to lift it. He became aware of his arms and legs, and everything else in between, slowly, one sensation at a time.

His eyes slid open a little, adjusting to the bright, bright light coming in....

White. Everything coming into his vision was pure, fuzzy white... he could feel his eyes trying to adjust to it and welcome it, at the same time...

"hello?"

A voice...there was someone next to him...He squinted, trying to get his eyes to focus enough to see—

"You really are awake."

The blur that was connected to the voice slowly came into focus, after much blinking. He found himself staring into large, green eyes, framed by a pleasant face and brown hair. She was wearing pink.

"I was worried you wouldn't wake back up," she said. She smiled. "What's your name?"

He tried to speak—and ended up coughing instead. The woman waited patiently, hands folded in her lap, as he calmed down again. He cleared his throat.

"I...where...?" he croaked. He almost didn't understand himself, his throat was so dry...

His coughing had jarred him out of what was left of his grogginess, and he looked around. He didn't recognize the room at all. Nor did he recognize the person sitting next to him...

"Are you from Domino?"

He nodded.

"Y-yeah," he said, his voice cracking. He looked at the woman again. "How do you know that?"

"You were talking about it in your sleep," she replied.

"Oh..."

"here."

She was holding out water to him.

"Thanks."

The moment it touched his lips, he started gulping, until it was gone.

"Feel better?"  
"Yeah," he said.

"So, what's your name?" She asked again.

"Yami," he said, now that he could talk, "Yami Atemuryoku."

"That's quite the last name," she said.

"Everyone says that," Yami said. The familiar conversation made him think of school. And then his family. The curse...

He reached up to the back of his neck. It was still there, warm against his skin. What had happened...?

"Where am I?" he asked, turning to the woman.

"Well," she said with a laugh, "That depends on how specific you want to be. The building you're in is the headquarters for the Restoration committee. Which is in the city of Hollow Bastion."

"Hollow...what?"

* * *

A/N: So yes. Yami's soul is now in the world of Kingdom Hearts. I danced around this idea for a long time, playing with some other plot lines that didn't involve other fandoms. However, this one showed the most potential; there's room for a lot of plot twists, a TON of characters I can draw on now, all tied together with abstract explanations that mirror what I've already been fabricating with the whole curse story.

I know that not everyone who's reading this story will be familiar with the Kingdom Hearts story. If you don't know the Kingdom Hearts story, don't worry—since this is from the YuGiOh characters' perspective, everything will be explained to them (and you) as needed for the story's sake. I will make sure to cover my bases and make this as clear as possible, unless it's intentionally meant to be vague.

However, if there's something that you still don't understand, please feel free to PM me about it; I can send you links to all sorts of resources. You don't have to go get the games and play them to know the complete story—all the details are online, and again, I'll be happy to clarify anything you may be confused about.

So with that said, I'll mark this story as officially COMPLETED (YAY), and move on to part two!

Until then!

--Trem.


End file.
